“WE DO MAPUCHE STUFF”
Cultural Transmission and Ethnic Identity among Mapuche Children
Report from a Minor Field Study
by Evangelina Villar Fuentes
A Master Thesis in Cultural Anthropology Department of Cultural Anthropology and Ethnology Uppsala University Supervisor: Juan Carlos Gumucio April 2004 “WE DO MAPUCHE STUFF” Cultural Transmission and Ethnic Identity among Mapuche Children
ABSTRACT This study deals with how the traditional knowledge of the Mapuche, in southern Chile, is transmitted to the younger generation. Special focus is put on how the children themselves view the world in which they live, and how they create their own version of the culture that is transmitted to them. Their own thoughts and reflections are viewed as important as the author consider children to be both objects and agents in the process of acquiring culture. Because even though their view of the world is influenced by the surrounding society they are active in the construction of meaning and in creating and internalising a worldview of their own. The cultural transmission of a minority culture is closely connected to the indigenous group’s ethnic identity, as much of what is transmitted is precisely what distinguishes the group from others. In this study special regard is given to traditional language and traditional religion as they are viewed as important ethnic markers. Both issues, language and religion, are seen through the eyes of four Mapuche girls. The study also presents a discussion about the importance of bilingual schooling as it is considered a vital element in enhancing the children’s knowledge of their maternal language. The implementation of bilingual education is also seen as a way for the State to acknowledge and support the continuing survival of an ethnic minority.
Keywords: Mapuche, children, socialisation, ethnic identity, language, religion, bilingualism.
2 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I would like to take this moment to thank all those who have helped and supported me during the long process of getting this thesis completed. My foremost debt is to the Mapuche, particularly the people of the indigenous communities in and around Melipeuco. My extended gratitude is of course due to my host-family, especially the girls, who took their time to welcome me into their lives and for answering all those complicated and sometimes silly questions. A special thanks to “Granny H.” for all the fascinating talks. I am in their debt and will keep them in my heart forever. I also want to thank Dra. Valdés for making the contact with the Andrés Huenupi community possible. I owe special thanks to my supervisor Dr. Juan-Carlos Gumucio for guiding me in my writing and for providing interesting and insightful comments on numerous specific points. I would also like to thank my good friend Ms. Magdalena Brzezinska whose encouraging pep talks made all the difference when things looked bleak and desperate. Thanks are also due to everyone at the Department of Cultural Anthropology at Uppsala University; their cheerful persistence in wanting to know how the study was coming along pushed me to do my best. The fieldwork in Alpehue was made possible by the generous financial support of SIDA (Swedish International Development Agency). Last but not least I would like to thank my family and friends, both in Chile and in Sweden, who showed large amounts of support and patience with me when writing this thesis. Needless to say, the experiences, the faults, and the interpretations are all mine.
3 ABSTRACT ...... 2 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS...... 3 INTRODUCTION...... 5 Fieldwork and Method ...... 7 Outline of the Study...... 9 I. ANTHROPOLOGY AND THE STUDY OF CHILDREN ...... 10 II. THEORETICAL POINTS OF DEPARTURE ...... 13 Self-identity...... 15 Psychological anthropology...... 16 Cognitive theory...... 18 Worldview...... 19 How do we understand our world?...... 20 Symbolic capital and habitus ...... 22 Acquisition of Culture: Enculturation and Socialisation...... 23 Social learning theory and the ‘developmental niche’ theory...... 29 III. ETHNOGRAPHIC AND HISTORICAL BACKGROUND...... 31 Earlier studies concerning the Mapuche...... 34 The Research Setting...... 37 IV. GROWING UP AS A MAPUCHE TODAY ...... 42 General Expectations for Children ...... 45 Children’s Everyday Lives: Socialisation in Context...... 49 V. LANGUAGE AND RELIGION AS ETHNIC MARKERS...... 53 VI. THE IMPORTANCE OF MAPUDUNGUN...... 58 The use of random words...... 62 VII. THE VIEW ON TRADITIONAL RELIGION...... 68 Participating in a Nguillatun ...... 74 VIII. CHILDREN AND THE LOSS OF CULTURE...... 79 CONCLUSION...... 87 GLOSSARY...... 91 BIBLIOGRAPHY ...... 92
4 INTRODUCTION
“Children are the seeds each society plants for its cultural sustenance” (Lancy 1996: 11)
People think and talk about their situation and experiences in many different ways. To be able to understand social life and cultural notions the starting point must be that people’s actions always have a meaning, at the same time one has to understand that meaning is something equivocal. People in all societies have conceptions and ideas about the world and the social relations in which they take part. These thoughts are not just personal, they are shared with other people in their surroundings, the thoughts are socially produced and in some way collective. From this follows that there is variation and complexity in the view of what children are as well. The boundaries between child and adult can shift according to both social structure and social practice. There is no specific way to be social and no given notions about the meaning of being human, thus there is no specific way to be a child in a society. The knowledge that is handed down to children and the perspectives they have of existence with its possibilities and limitations is related to the perspectives and social conditions of the adults (Norman 1996: 85). It is my intention to in this Master thesis describe and discuss the process by which the Mapuche of Southern Chile reproduce their culture and society as an ideological and moral system. The idea is to trace what the Mapuche value as Mapuche and how these values are transmitted to the younger generation. The main focus of the study is on the children themselves and their views of the world in which they live. I will claim that this is best served by looking at the children as both objects and agents in the transmission of culture. In my explicit aim to study children on their own terms, I follow
5 Steedly’s path of attending to “stories situated on the edge of exclusion” (1993: 31). While she emphasises the stories of women in a world dominated by men, I will describe the everyday lives of ethnic minority children and emphasise on their stories in a world dominated by adults. My opinion is that, if the women’s stories are viewed as untold and marginalized in the anthropological field, then the children’s stories are totally ignored. Much of the study will centre on socialisation, as it is the process whereby a child gains consciousness and procures the knowledge and abilities that fits the specific culture, which he or she was born into. A more simple way of putting it would be that we learn our culture through socialisation. Culture should, in this case, be understood in its most general sense; as a collective identity or a specific way of life shared by the members of a society or group. This definition of culture is close to Talcott Parsons, as he saw culture as a collective symbolic discourse. What it discoursed on was knowledge, beliefs, and values (Kuper 1999: 16). Every community or society has its own culture, with its specific values, that marks it off from all others, and every member of that community or society has a share in its culture. A discussion about cultural transmission of a minority culture invariably leads to the question of ethnic identity, because much of what is seen as valuable to teach the children is almost identical to the features that distinguish the ethnic group from other groups. The language of the Mapuche, the Mapudungun, and their traditional religion are generally considered the most important features of their culture. Knowledge of both is seen as vital to being a Mapuche and is therefore dealt with in this paper, as well as the children’s thoughts about these issues. In this study religion will be discussed merely as an aspect of the children’s symbolic capital, as a part of their ethnic identity. I believe that it is important not to view socialisation as “cultural programming” where the children passively absorb the effects that are
6 imposed on them. On the contrary, the child is in fact, from the start an active human being and I think that we must seek to understand what children give to the process of socialisation. Because even though the cultural learning is more intense during childhood, the learning and adaptation continues throughout our lifetime (Giddens 1993: 42). Whether or not anyone deliberately attempts to shape our behaviour, all of our early experiences provide opportunities to learn how others expects us to behave and what types of behaviour is rewarded (Ziegler et al. 1982: 5). This acquisition of common knowledge and behaviour makes it possible for the child to become a member of human society and absorb the taken-for-granted element of his/her culture. This study is also an effort to convey the importance of anthropological studies of the process of a child forming its own version of a culture. Schwartz is of the opinion that this should be studied directly, “through the child’s eyes, or at least over its shoulder and from its lips” (1981: 9). But the cultural view on children and how it is transformed can, according to Norman, not be understood without looking for a connection with the economic system and political structure (1996: 25). So, to be able to understand how the existence of children is portrayed and what significance they have in a specific society, one have to look at how the social and economic life is organised; how people live and work; how kinship is understood; how power and material assets are distributed, and so forth. My opinion is that anthropology is the discipline capable of bringing all these issues together and this view should hopefully come across in this paper.
Fieldwork and Method The thesis is based on a Minor Field Study, performed in the summer months in the southern hemisphere, December 2002 – March 2003 in the region of Araucania in southern Chile.
7 A short time after my arrival in Santiago, I came into contact with Dra. Judith Valdés, a sociologist specialised in rural economy at the Universidad de Chile. She has good contacts with various Mapuche communities in the outskirts of Temuco and is quite used to sending students to the field. After having a long conversation with her, where we discussed my study and its focus on children, she suggested a family that she thought suitable to accommodate both me and my study. A few days later Valdés organised for me to accompany one of her former students to the small town of Melipeuco, around 90 km from Temuco, so that she could introduce me to the family. After participating in a meeting in the town hall, we drove out on dusty roads, deep into the countryside to the location of Alpehue. The meeting with the family went much better than I expected as, they “had actually missed having one of Dra. Judith’s students around”. The family consisted of two parents but more importantly (for my study), four girls between 7 and 13 years. When I explained the focus of the study the parents nodded approvingly and welcomed me as “the children’s guest”, and assured me that I could stay for the whole duration of the fieldwork. The method used is what is generally employed in ethnographic studies, namely, participant observation and interviewing informants in their own environment. The interviewing part soon became a nuisance as I felt that information often emerged in everyday chats when my tape recorder was tucked away safely in my backpack. I quickly found out that just talking and interacting with people without a fixed agenda could be valuable sources. I found these informal conversations especially illuminating with regard to the Mapuche attitude toward children, language, religion and social change. Even though there were a lot of children in the rest of the community I chose to dedicate most of my time with the host-family’s four girls. The reasons being that they all were in the right age-group, they all had different views of Mapuche culture and identity, and that I could observe them in their
8 everyday activities. The decision to give the “leading roles” to girls exclusively is a conscious one. It is based on the common notion of women as “the bearers of culture”. However, this does not mean that I did not talk to any boys at all. Their voices are also heard, but in a more indirect manner. This way of participant observation with very informal chats turned out to be more effective than regular and recorded interviews. It was a better mode of working, especially when the children in many cases felt inhibited by the tape recorder and me in the role of an anthropology student. When “armed with a tape recorder” I was in a way more intimidating than me being just a curious friend wanting to know about the children’s thoughts on different aspects of being Mapuche. Instead we formed a relationship based on friendship and co-operation, as the girls became my most valued informants. My information was gathered in the most unusual of places; while walking the long way to their grandmother’s house, or while sitting high up in the cherry trees, or while chasing around after lost sheep, or while searching for firewood or while relaxing after a rough game of palin and so on.
Outline of the Study The first part of the paper is primarily concerned with the theoretical framework of the study. The focus here is on rather abstract issues as the notion of Self, worldview and transmission of culture. These theoretical tools for the study are described and discussed in chapter two, while the first chapter is centred on the fact that anthropology as a discipline has not been preoccupied with studying children. The second part, from chapter three and onwards, is more ethnographic as the focus is shifted to the Mapuche and the field. A brief look at their millenarian history is presented in chapter three. The chapter also contains a short review of some earlier studies made among the Mapuche, special interest
9 is placed on those commenting their social organisation and those who focus on kinship and family relations. Here, I also include a more detailed description of the community where the fieldwork was done. Chapter four is dedicated to the expectations adults have on children, both generally and in the specific context of the Mapuche. It is also concerned with how the children view their everyday lives; how they work and play, and what, if any, responsibilities they have. The three following chapters, five to seven, comprise a description of how children create their own version of the Mapuche culture transmitted to them and consequently how they perceive their ethnic identity. This is done by looking at ethnicity from two different perspectives, namely, language and religion. The last chapter is where I will analyse the different aspects of children, culture and ethnicity that have come to light in the previous chapters. The paper is concluded with some final remarks and a well-needed glossary for those who are not familiar with the Mapudungun.
I. ANTHROPOLOGY AND THE STUDY OF CHILDREN Every society has its own notions of children and the experience of being a child varies both socially and historically. This in turn means that ‘childhood’ does not have the same social meaning in all societies, and childhood might, in some cases, not even appear as a specific concept (Norman 1996: 24). If childhood is not a given situation, as it varies socially and culturally, in time and space, how can one then find out how the lives of different children are shaped? How can one know how they perceive the world in which they live?
10 The interest in child-rearing and social development is, according to Goslin, “as old as man” (1969: 2). But this interest has not been the subject of more serious research and theoretical work within the anthropological field. Why is that, when anthropologists devote their research mainly towards the understanding of how people create and are shaped by their socio-cultural world? As a discipline it wants to know what people do and what they say, how they classify and organise the world around them. People’s actions are related to what they say and their own interpretations of what they do (Norman 1996: 165). With the method of participant observation, the anthropologist follows and tries to become part of the Other’s social relations and listens to the said as well as the unsaid. So why has this devotion to the Other not been extended to the Other’s children? If anthropology is concerned with shared and culturally patterned experiences, then why has the interest in studying children’s experiences as bearers of culture not been greater? The fact is that anthropologists, in general, have not been very interested in children as part of socio-cultural life. Some information about children is usually described very briefly in chapters of “growing up” or “social organisation” (Morton 1996: 8). But ethnographical material has rarely been collected with a systematic focus on children and socialisation as such. This lack of anthropological child studies is closely linked to what Cohen refers to as “the neglected self” (1994). He goes on to say that anthropologists have always been more interested in studying structures and had a tendency to not “attribute any importance to the problem of what these structures actually meant to those who populated them” (Cohen 1994: 14). Observations on the training of children in specific kinship behaviour have, for example, tended to be focused on the given kinship system rather than the children in the same system (Mayer 1970: xiv). Other anthropologists usually restricted their
11 description and discussion of formal education processes to the meaning and significance of rites de passage. One exception is Kidd’s “Savage childhood” (1906), about the lives of Bantu children in South Africa. This is regarded as a pioneering work in the ethnography of children (Jahoda & Lewis 1986: 2). Others like Malinowski, for example, had relatively little to report or to say about the lives of the Trobriand children. He did, however, encourage his students, to include the interaction between parents and children in the socialisation process within the study of kinship, and to observe how knowledge of specialised techniques was taught and passed on (ibid.: 6). But despite these recommendations, children continued to be ignored. One could say that the children were not only not heard but also not seen. A slight change came with the emergence of the culture-and-personality school. Mead in particular, placed child development at the centre of her interpretation of culture. But as the culture-and-personality school focused mainly on the characteristics of whole societies, it had little to say about the ways children’s ideas were actually formed or how they acquired particular skills. They also wrote very little about children’s everyday lives (Jahoda & Lewis 1986: 10f). While anthropology has ignored children in culture, developmental psychology has ignored culture in children. This has, according to Schwartz, resulted in an ignorance of the process and content of the child’s emerging competence as a member of a culture (1981: 4). His statement is shared with Jahoda and Lewis, who claim that the neglect in the transmission of cultural knowledge and in the inculcation of social norms has to do with the fact that many anthropologists tended to have a strong anti-psychological stance (1986: 8). One of the main reasons for the anthropological neglect for children is that the idea of socialisation has long been viewed as an especially
12 “psychological” kind of subject. The idea that psychology is not for anthropologists have in many ways characterised anthropology’s view towards socialisation studies. But it is, according to Mayer, possible to study socialisation by regular anthropological means, without special recourse to psychology. It is also possible to draw in psychological concepts, where desired, without necessarily altering the anthropological explanation (1970: xvi). This is especially interesting in the study of children as the anthropological way to work and perceive reality contributes to the possibilities to understand how children live in a society, how they view life and how adults view children (Norman 1996: 166). This brings us to the theoretical framework of this study where different strands of theories are going to be presented. Theories that will guide the reader into the reality of four Mapuche girls.
II. THEORETICAL POINTS OF DEPARTURE How does a child gain access to its own culture and what is it exactly that the child is supposed to absorb? What, in our lives and in our view of the world, do we consider important enough that we feel the need to pass on to future generations? To find answers to these rather complex questions there are some issues to focus on. First, one has to find out what a human being (in this case, a child) is. A logical starting point would then be the constitution of Self or how one comes to form a self-identity. This formation of Self does not occur in a socio- cultural vacuum, as the Self must act in, and is influenced by, the outside world. The second issue is finding out what the world is, and what is included in our understanding of that world. I use the term world in this context, to mean
13 the abstract reality that is reflected in our actions and ideals. This is what is commonly called “tradition”, the actions that are shaped by our view of the world and are rendered “right behaviour” in our own socio-cultural context. The third issue is the actual transmission of culture. What is transmitted and how is this transmission done? In this study, the question becomes, what does the Mapuche value as Mapuche and how do they inculcate these values in their children. But more importantly, how do the children themselves form their own version of that culture? Do they in any way ponder over what is taught them? These latter questions reflect the ambition to view cultural knowledge from the children’s point of view. I feel that the children’s own reflections are often ignored, as scholars are more interested in the actual traditions or the adults that transmit them. These three important issues; the Self, the world and the transmission of the world’s values to the individual are thus the theoretical starting points of this paper. They are intimately connected as the examination of the cultural construction of the Self does, according to Morton, inevitably lead to a consideration of child socialisation (1996: 15), because it is during the early years that the foundation is laid for future learning. Unfortunately there is no one socialisation theory; instead one is expected to make one’s way through a theoretical maze of different perspectives on the acquisition of culture, socialisation, and enculturation. The best way forward from this great variety of abstract theoretical constructs seems to be, to pick out bits of some of them and accommodate these bits into one’s own theoretical framework, fitted after one’s own interests. Morton (1996), for example, draws together a number of theoretical strands from sociological approaches to socialisation, ethnopsychology, and work on cultural identity and tradition to explore the ethnography of childhood in Tonga.
14 Next I will present, a brief look at some of theoretical perspectives I have chosen to become part of the theoretical framework for this paper. For the sake of simplicity I have bundled them together under the afore-mentioned important issues; Self-identity, worldview and transmission of culture.
Self-identity The formation of self-identity starts very early on in infancy, and is intertwined with the notion of the Other. To separate the two would be almost impossible, because it is through the sense of Self that one develops the notion of the Other. Jackson exemplifies this with that it is in the gaze, touch, smell, taste, and hearing of the mother that a child first becomes aware of his or hers own presence (1995: 118). The feeling that the parental figure has a separate identity, distanced from the child's own, grows out of the emotional acceptance of absence. It is a belief that the carer will return, even though he or she is not in the immediate proximity of the child. This basic trust grows from what Winnicott calls “the potential space”, which both connects and separates the child and its carer. Basic trust is a prerequisite for the construction of both self-identity and the identity of other people and objects. The potential space between the child and its carers makes it possible for the child to distinguish the other object as “not- me” (Giddens 1997: 51ff). From a situation where the child was fused together with its carer, the child is now capable to distance itself and experience an identity of its own. This does not mean that the small child is a “being” yet, it is still a “being in the making” that has to “come alive” by the nurturing environment created its carers. Emotional acceptance of the reality of the outside world is a necessary prerequisite for a human existence (Giddens 1997: 55). This emotional acceptance is at the same time the beginning of a self-identity, as the child
15 learns what is “I” and what is “not-I”. The Self is separated from the Other, the subject is experienced as separate from the object. This is the case in early childhood, but as we grow older the issue of Self/Other and subject/object get a bit more complex. Our Self is transformed by our experiences and in many cases we act differently in different situations, but we are still acting inside what we consider to be our world and acting according to our view of that world. As I stated earlier, the issue of the Self have generally been neglected in anthropology. This may have to do with its close connection to psychology. This aversion began to change in the 1960’s when psychological anthropology emerged as a new sub discipline. It is based on some of the central concerns of the culture-and-personality school and is, according to Hsu (1961), a conscious effort to blend psychology and anthropology.
Psychological anthropology Psychological anthropology deals with (1) the conscious or unconscious ideas shared by a majority of individuals in a given society as individuals, and (2) the conscious or unconscious ideas governing the action of many individuals in a given society as a group (Hsu 1961: 10). Both of these are quite different from the unique personality of the individual, as dealt with in regular psychology. Psychological anthropologists, “deal only with those characteristics of the individual’s mind which are shared as part of a wider fabric of human minds” (ibid.: 8). Several examples of joint work between psychologists and anthropologists intended to bridge the gap between individual behaviour and higher-level structural aspects of a culture. These ventures will, according to Jahoda and Lewis, enlarge our understanding of the processes linking the macro-levels of society and culture with the micro-levels of individual
16 development. In the psychological study of child development systematic, anthropological style ethnographic observation of natural behaviour is coming to play an increasingly important role (Jahoda and Lewis 1986: 14ff). While in principle, only a part of the child’s acquisition of adult behaviour and personality characteristics is strictly socialisation, socialisation permeates so completely the child’s growth and development that it is almost impossible to separate socialisation from child development in general (Baldwin 1969: 325). This is yet another example of the necessity of co- operation between anthropology and psychology. One of the more interesting theories within psychological anthropology is ethno-psychological theory. It emphasises the parental goals for the children, especially the one regarding the child acquiring cultural values. But the main focus of ethno-psychological studies is cultural understanding of person, Self and emotion (Morton 1996: 11). Ethno-psychological beliefs about the nature of the Self, of individual variation, and of development are examined as they shape and reflect the parental goals for the children (Lutz 1983: 248). The points of theory are those on which many adults agree and which they use in their discussions about personality and behaviour in both children and adults. Ethno-psychological theory provides the model with which adults approach and attribute meaning to their children’s behaviour and development. Parents approach emotional socialisation against the background of the three high-order goals; child survival, eventual economic self- maintenance, and the acquisition of cultural values (Lutz 1983: 259). The relational nature of personhood and the way in which Self is defined and experienced is through relationships with others. It is therefore important to examine not only individuals’ subjectivity, but also their self- representation. Whereas socialisation reveals important aspects of ethno- psychology, the reverse is also true. Particular beliefs and practices associated with child socialisation become comprehensible in the light of the wider
17 ethno-psychological context. Attempts to affect children’s development – by instructing, disciplining, and so on – are conceived in terms of broader notions of personhood and culturally appropriate behaviour (Morton 1996: 15). Many of the conceptual tools of anthropology are considerably different from those of psychologists. Sometimes they use the same terminology in a rather different sense. Take the term cognition for example; psychologists see this as the inferred processes of thinking at the individual level. Anthropologists, on the other hand, employ cognition to refer to what people think of their collective cultural representations, particular cosmologies, belief systems etc. (Jahoda and Lewis 1986: 18). The difference lies in studying what people think to how people think.
Cognitive theory The concept of Self is what it means to be a human being. It is culturally shaped, and is better understood as self-representation. Personhood, on the other hand, refers to the level of ideals – what someone in a given society “should” be like. This is central to any discussion of cognitive development, since the process of acquiring knowledge of all kinds can be delineated only by knowing the socially agreed expectations of what it is that a child is to become (Howell 1986: 147). With learning and maturity, the cognitive representation separates the Self and the environment. The individual Self is seen as a separate entity moving within the external environment. The cognitive representation later becomes coded in a more complex fashion reflecting the acquisition of language, cultural labels etc. (Baldwin 1969: 327). In the most general sense, a cognitive representation is a coding of the information in the environment, but it must be a coding of the information in the environment, i.e. the relationships among items as well as the items themselves. The cognitive representation also embodies beliefs about the
18 environment that are cultural conventions (Baldwin 1969: 333). He continues by stating that cognitive representations come to reflect the child’s knowledge about the world; and his/her acquisition of cultural beliefs (ibid.: 335). I now turn to that context, the world as we perceive it and what actions and practices the Self is supposed to embody.
Worldview We are able to constitute both Self and the Other early in our childhood; this helps us later when we start our quest to understand the world we live in, and all that is connected to it. As we grow up we become more aware of the fact that we share the same reality as other people and that our actions may also be shaped by others than ourselves. This feeling that one shares a reality with other people and objects is, according to Giddens, both stable and frail. Its strength is created by the authenticity in the everyday social interactions, the contexts that are produced and reproduced by the common agents (1997: 49). The fact is that with learning and maturity, the cognitive representation separates the Self and the environment. The individual is seen as acting, feeling and wanting, and is represented as behaving in an external environment. An individual’s worldview is basically the way in which that person perceives his/her environment. It is a basic cultural orientation that is shared with the other members of one’s society. It concerns the fundamental assumptions of a people about the nature of the world and the groups place in it. This is expressed in a shared understanding that is reflected in the society’s philosophy, rituals, morals and so on. The way a group views the world is acquired by a young age. The image of the world is transmitted by the beliefs and practices of those surrounding the child. The child is taught to categorise both the physical and social world
19 and what these categories mean. The child is also taught the groups notions of right and wrong behaviour.
How do we understand our world? For a certain answer or action, to be seen as right, it has to be based on a common frame of reality (Giddens 1997: 48). If this given action in a given situation is considered a success, it brings about a whole body of wisdom and sayings, like “this is the way we have always done it” or “it is our custom”. At the deeper level, the success of an action is connected to the principles of the ethos, which determines “reasonable” or “unreasonable” conducts for every agent in that situation. Geertz states that a group’s most comprehensive idea of order is based in their “ethos – the tone, character, and quality of their life, its moral and aesthetic style and mood – and their world-view – the picture they have of how the things in sheer actuality are” (1966: 3). The ethos and world- view define people’s notions of themselves, both as individuals and a group, as well as the rest of the world. Our actions make sense in the cultural system we have been accustomed to. This is also addressed by Jackson, who states that,
The world is never something finished, something which thought can bring to a close; the world is always in the making, and our thoughts, like our actions, have meaning only in relation to the practical and social life in which we are engaged (Jackson 1996: 4).
The world is simply as it is, because it is as it should be. But what is it in our understanding of the world that decides what is reasonable and what is not? The notion of worldview is closely connected to the notion of lifeworld. I see it as a group’s worldview emerging from the perception of lifeworld. The notion of lifeworld is based on the philosopher Diltheys’s idea of the life-
20 nexus (Jackson 1996: 15). The term life-nexus was incorporated in Dilthey’s general program for the development of the human sciences. It would place conscious experience and the interrelationship between Self and world (the life-nexus) at its core. It would, in contrast to the natural sciences, emphasise the importance of purpose, will and agency in human life. These ideas are in a way replicated in Husserl’s notion of the lifeworld as a domain characterised by the activities of everyday life (Feather 2000: 83). The lifeworld is the world of immediate experience, of sociality, common sense, and the shared experience that exists for us independent of and prior to any reflection upon it (Jackson 1996: 16). In a way it seems to be what Bourdieu calls a doxa, as it is something one tends not to question, and thus take to be true. Husserl’s intentions to achieve a universalising theory was criticised by scholars, who turned against the notion of being able to speak of the true being of all humanity. Especially anthropologists found little value in a theory that was grounded in the being of European bourgeois intellectuals. For how could a theory based on European thought be applicable to the experiences of people in other societies? This is a major question that in my opinion is applicable to most known theories, even though some experiences are universal and can be studied as such. When it comes to the experience of life and the world, it can be seen as universal as we all can agree that we all have that experience. However, what is not universal, are the contents of that experience, what we choose to acknowledge in that experience. Husserl’s notion of lifeworld and Bourdieu’s view on habitus can be used to explain the more generalised experience while the more individual experience is culture specific and should be studied from another perspective.
21 Symbolic capital and habitus The term capital is for Bourdieu, not a trait that can be ascribed to groups or individuals separately. It is seen as a social relation, a kind of social energy that neither exists nor produces its effects other than within the field where it is produced or reproduced. Capital is not just an objective structure; it exists in both an institutionalised and embodied form. The embodied existential form is known as habitus (Broady 1996: 41). I take habitus to be a form of symbolic capital, as it is what is recognised by a social group as valid and valuable. This validation is not an individual concern for it rests on the group’s beliefs. In a “traditional society” the symbolic assets are mainly stored in the body, in the form of customs, dispositions, and habitus (Broady 1996: 50). Tradition is passed forward in the interaction between people, and is therefore part of the socialisation process. The symbolic capital is thus an embodied ideal. It is what you learn without knowing that you are learning. The notion of lifeworld is comparable with Bourdieu’s notion of habitus. Bourdieu views habitus as a system of dispositions, which decides how people act, values and think in a given social context (Broady 1996: 51). This system is like an immanent law, imbedded in the body and mind of each individual. It is laid down in each agent in his/her early childhood as a way of mastering everyday life (Bourdieu 1977: 80). The customs that are engraved in the body and mind is what is transferred in the socialisation process. It is a form of socialised subjectivity and it is the basis for how we are affected by our social life and society at large. The homogeneity of the habitus is what causes practices to be immediately intelligible and foreseeable, and hence taken for granted (ibid.: 80). In this sense, it too can be considered to be a doxa. At the same time that the habitus decides what actions, thoughts and aspirations appear as possible, necessary, and valuable, it also marks other actions, thoughts, and aspirations as impossible, improper, or even despicable.
22 This is why practices are liable to incur negative sanctions when they occur in environments that are too distant from that to which they are objectively fitted. Bourdieu formulates this as “an acquired system of generative schemes objectively adjusted to the particular conditions in which it is constituted, the habitus engenders all the thought, all the perceptions, and all the actions consistent with those conditions, and no others” (1977: 95). It is a subjective but not individual system of internalised structures, schemes of perception, conception and action. This system is common to all members of the same group. Bourdieu sees it as “an objective co-ordination of practices” and a “sharing of a world-view” (ibid.: 86). Rydström states in her article that,
Bourdieu connects the perspective of embodiment with children’s learning, by arguing that through processes of embodiment, a child creates a habitus. This habitus is a combination of a system of schemes of production of practices, and a system of perception and appreciation of practices (2001: 396).
In creating a habitus, a child learns to read the world of objects, and how to act physically and verbally. The structure of the habitus later becomes the basis of perception and appreciation of all future experiences.
Acquisition of Culture: Enculturation and Socialisation A large part of socialisation consists in the simple effort to inculcate values. This system of values mainly expresses what is sometimes called culture (Inkeles 1969: 618). My definition of culture in this thesis is that culture is essentially a matter of ideas and values, a collective cast of mind, a shared way of thinking about the world. These ideas and values form part of an ideological and moral system, which is passed on to future generations by the process of socialisation. Again, it is important to remember that children
23 should not be seen as passive receivers, because they function as both objects and agents in the transmission of culture. All individuals, both children and adults alike, are in fact involved in the construction of meaning. None of us are passive receptors of cultural tradition, cosmovisions or beliefs. We are all active participants in creating our own view of the world even though that view is influenced by the surrounding society. Jenks claims that, “Children are depotentiated within socialization theory; they become nominal ciphers seemingly without an active dimension” (1986: 10). He concludes that most studies put their emphasis on a taken-for-granted adult world, and therefore fail to constitute the child as ontology in its own right (ibid.: 10). The goal of the socialisation process is to guide the children to become effectively functioning members of the particular society, or what Steedly calls “the existing ideological field” (1993: 26), they are born into. Most societies assign primary responsibility to parents for the socialisation of children. But the process of bringing up children must, according to Lancy, also include provision for cultural transmission, or enculturation (1996: 25). This responsibility is, however, too broad and diffuse to be left solely to parents. It may now be a good time to deal with the problematic relation between enculturation and socialisation, but also to define what is meant with each of them. Enculturation as a term was, according to Lancy, coined by Herskovits. It would handle a broader agenda for human development, which includes all the skills, knowledge, and beliefs that are part of the repertoire of a competent adult member of the society (1996: 19). A similar description is given by Wilbert who states that it is “the process by which the individual through informal and non-formal modes of cultural transmission learns the language, the technological, socio-economic, ideational, as well as the cognitive and emotional patterns of culture” (1976: 8). Herskovits contrasted enculturation with the term socialisation, a narrower concern, for the way parents and others
24 shape children’s emerging character and interpersonal behaviour and manners (Lancy 1996: 19). So, a more simple way of putting it would be that while enculturation is concerned with what is transmitted, socialisation deals with how it is transmitted. As this thesis deals with both what is transmitted and how it is transmitted, I have for the sake of simplicity chosen to refer to all transmission of culture as socialisation. This decision is also based on the fact that the most recent studies concerning transmission and acquisition of culture I have come across, almost all speak of socialisation when they in fact handle both issues. Because the cultural environment where we are born and grow up in, affects our behaviour, it can be seen as we lose all our own will and freedom. It might seem as if we, in a way, are moulded after a set of social patterns. The fact that we, from the very first moments of our lives, interact with other people affects our personality, our values, and our behaviour. But socialisation is also what constitutes the basis for our individuality and freedom. Through socialisation each of us develops a sense of Self, an identity, and an ability to independent thinking and acting. So, even though socialisation may seem to result in a degree of uniformity as the members of a society come to share values and attitudes, there will always be considerable variation. Variations that are reflected in the different statuses and roles individuals occupy within a society for example. Socialisation is more than just the training of children. Socialisation simultaneously describes a process external to the person, the individual’s experience of the process, and the end product (Inkeles 1969: 615). So, it is a rather complex social learning process and as such, it gives rise to a great deal of different conceptions within diverse scientific fields. A wide range of viewpoints, intellectual styles and divergent theoretical perspectives has approached all aspects of socialisation. But historically, the systematic study
25 of socialisation has its roots in three fields; psychology, sociology, and anthropology. Psychology focused on the development of individual characteristics relevant to social behaviour and on those basic processes through which these behavioural tendencies are learned. Sociology concentrated on characteristics of specific groups or institutions in which socialisation occurs and on the common social skills acquired by individuals in varying contexts. Anthropology, on the other hand, viewed socialisation from the standpoint of the broader culture, which helps to determine the overall boundaries of socialisation experiences (Goslin 1969: 1f). Anthropology stressed the importance of cultural rather than biological factors as sources of influence on personality development, and tended to describe socialisation at the level of culture rather than at the level of the individual. But even though psychology, sociology, and anthropology view socialisation from different perspectives, they all have the same starting point. Psychologists and anthropologists do not view socialisation, as a concept, very differently. This is not because they have agreed to agree, but because the notion is so diffuse in both disciplines that a more common core of meaning is often used. Socialisation is therefore considered to be a process whereby children become effectively functioning members of a particular society (Jahoda and Lewis 1986: 19). All students of socialisation are concerned with analysing the way people come to behave in a manner that permits them to get along successfully in the culture in which they live. Learning to behave in this fashion is by no way as simple as it sounds. Every society has a large and distinctive set of rules that governs the behaviour of its members. Their aim is to understand how these norms or rules are communicated to, understood by, and internalised by the children who are the “targets of socialisation” (Ziegler et al. 1982: 12). The rules deal with issues like; honesty and morality, the control and display of
26 aggression, sexual behaviour, public and private, dependency, and modes of address and communication (ibid.: 4). A large part of socialisation consists in this effort to inculcate the basic values of the society. This moral system mainly expresses what is sometimes called culture. Culture, in this case, is seen as a people’s shared mode of experiencing and understanding the world. In societies where parents believe that their own actions have some effect on the moral development of their children, the value system of the culture will be an important part of what is consciously and intentionally transmitted to the child (Whiting et al. 1974: 155). The fact that a society and its culture are in operation both before and after given individuals’ lifetimes, has led many social scientists to view society as having an existence of its own, independent of the individuals who at any moment make up its membership. Within such a framework, concern is almost exclusively with culturally determined aspects of behaviour, and socialisation may be seen simply as the necessary learning of the culture by each new generation (Ziegler et al. 1982: 118). This approach sees individuals as developing passively, as their behaviour is in some way determined by demands of their society. In contrast to this approach, individuals can be seen as integrally related to society and as developing actively in relation to the demands of social life. Cultures or social systems may be seen as internalised in the personalities of society members. Every individual can be seen as the outcome of a given socialisation process. This outcome, successful or unsuccessful from the perspective of a particular social system in a given time and place, will in fact, depend on a series of inputs. It will depend on the individual, the persons involved in the socialising, and finally the result of socialisation will be shaped by certain more or less fixed or regular aspects of the network of social relations in which the individual lives (Inkeles 1969: 617). Culture is transmitted in many
27 ways, and anthropologists have studied socialisation, largely referring to childrearing practices through which, it is believed, motivational continuity is achieved in a culture. The child is seen as an asocial or pre-social animal to be inducted into a society by “training” or “rearing”, largely by the effects of reinforcements, gratifications and frustrations (Schwartz 1981: 9). Traditional psychological theories of socialisation would lead one to believe that social behaviour can be acquired only through identification with real-life models, and that the behavioural transmission process is unidirectional, and that social organisational systems do not exist as sources of values and conduct (Bandura 1969: 247). The term socialisation as used until the late 1970’s referred to the internalisation of culturally appropriate norms and values, with children viewed as basically passive and malleable (Morton 1996: 8). This unidirectional model of development was later rejected as new theories stressed that social development involves reciprocal influences. A new interactive view of socialisation emerged, children were seen as agents in the process (ibid.: 9). One of the most significant changes in socialisation theory in recent years has been in the conception of the child’s role in socialisation. The shift has been from a view of children as passive to one of children as active in shaping the social life and creating their own conceptions about existence (Norman 1996: 25). Jahoda and Lewis claim that three theoretical models have been used on the nature of the socialisation process over time (1986: 19). The first is called the ‘unfolding’ model and was used from Rousseau and onwards. According to this model the caretaker is only there to provide a suitable environment for permitting natural development of the child to occur. The child would more or less socialise himself/herself without much help from anybody. The second model is called the clay moulding model where the child is regarded as mainly passive and being shaped by society. The third model is the interactive model
28 that portrays socialisation as a struggle between the child wishing to gratify impulses and gain independence while society, in the form of caretakers and authority figures, seeks to make the child conform. The two former models have been discarded while the third govern most current research (ibid.: 19). These theories described by Jahoda and Lewis are a good starting point, as they are fairly general in their assumptions. However, they do not in any way, explain what people learn and why they learn it. This is, according to Goslin, just as important as how they learn it (1969: 2). As I have mentioned earlier, socialisation describes (1) a process external to the person, (2) the individual’s experience of the process, and (3) the end product, “the socialised individual”. So, to further complicate matters, most of these theories are very similar, as they deal with exactly the same aspect (socialisation), they just choose to emphasise differently (the process, the experience or the result). My ambition with this paper is to look at all these things; how it is done (the process), how the children reflect on what is taught them (the experience), and how the children and their parents view what the child knows (the result). If the task of the theory of socialisation is to explain how the child becomes an individual who fits into his society, who states its beliefs and values, who has acquired skills that are important for the maintenance of the society, then a theory of socialisation must, according to Baldwin, be based on a theory of behaviour and a theory of learning (1969: 325). These theories are more anthropological, in the sense that they are concerned with the context surrounding the child.
Social learning theory and the ‘developmental niche’ theory These theories have in common that they emphasise the importance of the social and cultural environment in the child’s development. The values that
29 are expressed and inculcated in the child will not exist in a socio-cultural vacuum. The value system of any culture has a certain integrity and autonomy which permits it to persist relatively intact over time. It reflects the influence of conditions in the social structure in which the values are operative (Inkeles 1969: 618). Bandura agrees with this statement as he concludes that complex cultural patterns of behaviour are, in large part, transmitted and regulated at a social- systems level (1969: 255). He states further that, “research based on social- learning theory and analyses of behaviour as a function of socio-structure variables, indicates that a broad range of modelling influences must be incorporated in a comprehensive theory of behavioural transmission” (ibid.: 247). The complex repertories of behaviour displayed by members of society are to a large extent acquired with little or no direct tuition, but through observation of response patterns exemplified by various socialisation agents. Harkness and Super suggest that further progress in understanding the acquisition of culture will require a combination of developmental and cultural perspectives. In this view, it will be necessary to look at the process of human development itself, as it interacts with the environments provided by different cultures (1983: 222). They see the cultural construction of child development as having three main dimensions; (1) culturally derived criteria for the duration of each developmental stage, (2) a set of characteristic physical and social settings, and (3) culturally shared expectations for behaviour by and towards individuals in each stage. The latter dimension can in a simpler way be described as parental beliefs and values. Harkness and Super suggest that the developmental niche, as they term the structuring of the child’s environment, is the primary source for the child’s acquisition of culture (Harkness and Super 1983: 223). The expectations that are put on children are generally shared by both parents and society but in this thesis I argue that this is not as straightforward
30 as it seems in all cases. The expectations are made problematical for the children when they belong to a minority culture like the Mapuche. This is going to be discussed further in chapter four. All the different aspects of Self, world, and transmission of culture that have been described in this chapter comprise the foundation for the study done in the field. The following chapters present the empirical material where hopefully the theories will come alive in the voices of my informants.
III. ETHNOGRAPHIC AND HISTORICAL BACKGROUND The earliest reports about the Mapuche are found in Peruvian chronicles, as a result of Inca interest in colonising central Chile. As these early sources are rather scattered and fragmentary, their pre-Spanish culture will probably never be known with certainty. Well-documented Mapuche history begins only after the middle of the 16th century, when the Spaniards had constructed garrison settlements in Chile and came into sustained contact with the “Indians” south of the Bío Bío river (Faron 1961: 9). For more that 300 years after the Spanish invasion of Chile, the Mapuche maintained considerable autonomy over their territory. The Mapuche lacked any strong over-all state, perhaps this very lack of a highly centralised government made them resist the Spanish conquest longer than three centuries. Chilean independence from Spain in 1818 awakened national interest in the further colonisation of the indigenous zone. Due to the increase of exportation of agricultural products, the need for territorial expansion grew. The national border was moved further and further south into Mapuche controlled regions. The new national government tried on the one hand to protect the Mapuche from the sharp practices of land grabbers, but on the other hand it provided a means for eventual absorption of the Mapuche into
31 the national population (Faron 1961: 106). The Mapuche staged their last general uprising in the early 1880’s. It ended in their defeat, “pacification” and settlement on small reservations. From this moment on their society underwent internal changes, as well as changes in their relation to the State and to the rest of the Chilean society (Bengoa 2000: 329). After 1883 their territory was studded with military garrisons and Chilean towns, and crosscut by a network of roads and railroad lines (Faron 1961: 107). Mapuche territory was first reduced through force of arms, and after “pacification”; it was reallocated through the force of political action. They were made to comply with “civilisation”; they were handed small plots of land, they were herded into reservations and involuntarily transformed into small peasants. The Chilean agrarian system was based on large-scale farms called “fundos”. The system was well established before the 1940’s and the reservations, known in Chile as “reducciones indígenas”, became largely attached to the farms. This was achieved by both expropriation and by employing the Mapuche as cheap labour (Berglund 1977: 88, Berdichewsky 1975: 5). The aim of the Chilean government was to individualise land ownership so that each family had its own plot. This goal was set up in the hope of incorporating the Mapuche more quickly into the nation by accelerating the breakdown of the Mapuche social structure (Berglund 1977: 32). This major change in the economic infrastructure, going from communal property to small land property, weakened the indigenous community. One of the main effects of this change was that their subsistence economy became increasingly tied to the market economy. This increased the crisis in the reservations, when the loss of land was combined with a relative demographic explosion. This came as a result of several communities herded together in confined spaces like the reservations. Each reservation comprised of a lonko of each locality and all that “belonged” to him; his family, his protégés, neighbours and other
32 families that lived closed by. This is how the reservation community emerged (Bengoa 2000: 330). All this combined led to a drastically reduced man-land relation. This produced a latent unemployment in the reservations that soon led to migration to the large cities (Berdichewsky 1975: 5f). The period of the reservations was a dark time for the Mapuche. It is best described by Gumucio, when he states that, “the loss of the territory and of autonomy was a traumatic collective experience” (1999: 38). They were years filled with fear, hunger, loss of identity and the reformulation of a new culture as an ethnic minority in the midst of a Chilean rural society (Bengoa 2000: 329). The situation also transformed the social organisation of the Mapuche. Bengoa tells of how their space for production and reproduction was reduced and how they had to change their customs and subsistence methods (ibid.: 330). Social disintegration also followed as families belonging to different patrilineages were forced together in the same reservation (Gumucio 1999: 48). The land that was formally owned by the whole community now began to be worked separately by nuclear families while their occupied territory was handed out to foreign and national colonisers. The integration led to a decline of their cultural identity. The decline was seen as so disruptive that many scholars speculated in the late 19th century that the large-scale and rapid changes would lead to the general breakdown of Mapuche social structure. But even if the changes have been many and sometimes devastating, the Mapuche have managed to revitalise their culture. Many traditional patterns have disappeared and new forms of social organisation have emerged. Their customs have acquired new forms and functions; some have disappeared while others are still part of the Mapuche cultural heritage from pre-reservation times. The situation of the Mapuche can thus be described in terms of continuity and change. While many characteristic features of Mapuche society may not be the same as in pre-reservation times, they are still a very distinct ethnic group with
33 an own language and a traditional religious belief. All the modifications that they have had to do, have run parallel to the traditional structure of Mapuche society and cultural values.
Earlier studies concerning the Mapuche Much of the literature about the Mapuche is mainly concentrated around two areas of life; the political problems and the religious experiences. Works focused on the political issue discuss the lack of political power of the Mapuche and their struggle for autonomy. They also reflect the conflict between the State and the Mapuche in regards to the involuntary resettlements due to the destruction of environmental resources in the name of “development”. The studies concerning their traditional religion are usually dedicated to the shamans/herbalists called machi and the community fertility ceremony, the nguillatun. It is in this second group of studies that most of the information on aspects related to the aim of the present study is found as they usually include a chapter on social organisation, i.e. society, family and kinship. Of the early-published materials none can be said to give special regard to anything related to the child. This is not until 1957 when Inez Hilger, a Benedictine Sister of St. Benedict’s Convent, published “Araucanian Child Life and its Cultural Background”. It is an essentially descriptive study, filled with all kinds of details of all aspects of child life. It is an investigation focused on examining all cultural traits that determines the practices connected to the development and socialisation of the child. Nothing is considered too small to be mentioned as all is described with the outmost care and detail; from lullabies, diapers, and weaning habits to dressing of the hair, games and handicrafts. One chapter is dedicated to the family’s status in the community. Here she concludes that the relation child-parent is based on
34 “reciprocal affection” and that the children are “adequately provided with food and clothing” (Hilger 1957: 47). Information regarding the child’s’ socio- cultural environment is also included as ”it seemed important not to ignore the milieu in which the child grew up” (ibid.: xi). Her intentions are good, I guess, but the children are still just described and she does not give them room to reflect over their own culture. It is actually very seldom they are heard at all even though the entire book is supposed to be about them. Hilger uses the term Araucanians when referring to the Mapuche. This is representative of the earlier literature that used the name applied by the Spaniards to the inhabitants of the district of Arauco. The name soon became the epitome for all the indomitable native inhabitants living south of the river Bío-Bío (Gumucio 1999: 29). The term Araucano or Araucanian was used until recent times but is now replaced by Mapuche, the name they always have used when referring to themselves. One of the early anthropologists who did extensive work concerning the Mapuche is Louis Faron. His fieldwork from the early 1950’s resulted in two important studies; “Mapuche Social Structure” from 1961 and “Hawks of the Sun: Mapuche Morality and its Ritual Attributes” from 1964. The latter was translated to Spanish as late as 1997, titled “Antüpaiñamko – Moral y ritual Mapuche.” Both works constitute an analysis of the Mapuche society as a whole, with the first focused on secular aspects of the society while the second discusses more supernatural aspects. Both are still considered pioneering anthropological work on the Mapuche and are still being referred to in almost all recent studies. The traditional view on kinship and family relations among the Mapuche in prereservation times are described by Faron as patrilineal and patrilocal (1997: 26ff). The latter have now suffered some alterations due to the reservation experience, nowadays uxorilocal residence or emigration to cities are common options due to increasing land scarcity (Gumucio 1999: 49).
35 Faron discusses the nuclear family group as consisting of men related to each other by patrilineal descent, and their wives and children. The family group could also include unwed women, widows and divorced women from the same patrilineage. This extended family group is seen by Faron as a residential unit tied together by blood and moral responsibilities (Faron 1997: 32). Faron also looks at the nuclear family as he in interested in the family as a “micro-cosmos of the lineage” and as a “chain of social relations over time” (1997: 37). He touches on the issue of cultural transmission when he states that within the home environment practical instructions are received from the parents, while instructions of traditional morality is given to children by their grandfather in a very informal way. This is mainly done by storytelling and myths that convey the importance of traditional values. He speculates that many of these foundations of right behaviour are still transmitted this way (ibid.: 39f). A reason for this is, according to Faron, that it is intimately related to the propitiation of ancestral spirits. The knowledge is transferred to the grandchild, who in the future is expected to treat the spirit of the deceased grandparent with respect and care in a ritual manner. The single most important integrative force operative in Mapuche society is the system of values that constitutes the fundament of religious morality. In the words of Faron, “this value system is the force that sustains the interpersonal relationships and extends beyond the bounds of any lineage or reservation” (1961: 217). This means that all Mapuche are linked together into a cultural, ethnic, and social entity. This entity constitutes the Mapuche world of the living and the dead. All Mapuche, both ancestors and descendants, strive to follow the right way of life as expressed in the admapu, which lay down the guidelines for Mapuche life and morality. Ad stands for the customs and traditions, or the organisation of things; it is the face of things, the way all should be seen; it stands for the person that shares the customs and laws of the
36 earth; it stands for the right way, the Mapuche way (De Augusta 1966: 1-2; Catrileo 1998: 12). With all this said, one could easily fit in all the Western theories of lifeworld, worldview, symbolic capital and habitus in one single Mapuche notion, the ad. The admapu regulates all the relations between the Mapuche, both living and dead. It is considered a sin for the living to fail to make proper propitiation of ancestral spirits. This means that morality is broken and the sin activates the forces of evil. If, by any reason, the ancestors are not approached correctly, they may fall victim to sorcerers, the kalku. If this happens, the ancestors become contaminated and evil. This duality between good and evil is expressed in an eternal struggle, which is re-enacted daily among the Mapuche. The struggle involves all Mapuche, as it engages both the ancestors and their descendants (Faron 1997: 9f). The struggle is believed to have its origin in myths and is dramatised in the rituals. But it is also present in everyday life as the Mapuche distinguishes between good and evil in all that surrounds them. The relationship between different generations helps to create and reinforce the notion of moral obligation. It is also a never-ending link between the past and the future, between the living and the dead. These bonds with the older generation and the ancestral spirits are central motives for proper behaviour among the Mapuche. It is therefore a cornerstone in the traditional knowledge that is passed on to the children. Examples of this will be shown in the empirical part of the paper.
The Research Setting The majestic volcano Llaima is situated in the national park Conguillio and is visible from the nearby small-town of Melipeuco. Llaima rises impressively behind the low houses of the very sleepy town. Melipeuco lies approximately
37 90 km east of the region capital Temuco, and is a typical Chilean small-town where everything worth mentioning lies adjacent to the towns’ only cemented road; the police station, the infirmary, the tourist office, the gas station, the community hall, the park, the marketplace, and the local governments’ offices. The area surrounding Melipeuco is home to fifteen different Mapuche communities. I was told that in the area of Melipeuco, 75% of the population is Mapuche. The community in which the present study was carried out is known as Andrés Huenupi and has its land in the location of Alpehue. Alpehue lies about 15 km southeast of Melipeuco, between high mountains dressed in all shades of green possible. It is beautifully located deep into the Chilean countryside, at the feet of the Andes where the air is clear and the colours are bright and strong. A long dusty gravel road cuts through the land of the community, with family homes scattered on both sides of the road. In many cases the houses are barely seen from the road, as the blackberry bushes grow tall and impenetrable on either side. The dominant colours are the green of the mountains, the blue of the sky and the yellow of the earth. That is until a vehicle drives by stirring up the gravel dust and everything turns sand colour. In their territory lives 35 families who are members of the indigenous community but within the same area three Chilean families also reside. This situation does not bring any hostility as the Chilean families are seen as good neighbours. The relationship between them is based on reciprocity and friendship. The family that hosted me is comprised by the father, Don Artemio and the mother, Sra. Alicia, and their four daughters; Roxana (13 years), Rayen (11 years), Ayelen (8 years) and Pirren (7 years). The oldest girls attended boarding school in Melipeuco during the week and returned home every weekend while the little ones went to the local school that is located near the entrance to the territory belonging to the community. The family lives the
38 furthest away, where the community land has its boundary with the location of Casa Blanca. This means that Ayelen and Pirren have about 8 km to school, a distance they walk every day unless they are lucky enough to get a ride from a passing vehicle. The girls are very easy-going, kind hearted, curious and seem generally to be very happy children. They all have very distinct and strong personalities. This could sometimes lead to loud discussions where they usually joined forces by pairing up in twos. The arguments would sometimes just die out by themselves when they agreed to disagree but sometimes it got to a point where their father had to step in as a referee. Their house is an old fashioned one, built with the traditional technique of “tejados”, which makes the outside of the house look like the scales of a fish. The land belonging to the family is extensive as it stretches far up the mountain behind the house. In the property there were a lot of animals; sheep that roamed the land until they had to be collected at dusk, and pigs that lived to create mischief when not running around the yard shrieking as soon as one of the many dogs came near. Everywhere there were hens that always seemed to be in the way and two roosters that had a crowing contest every three hours. Don Artemio is a small-scale farmer and a bee-keeper. During the summer the family sell honey from home, but Don Artemio is also a member of a local bee-keepers organisation in Melipeuco that produces honey for export. He is one of the few that has opted to branch out to apiculture in the community, the rest rely solely on their grain production and the selling of animals and/or their by-products. It was also very common for the men to leave the community in the summer period for seasonal work in the central parts of Chile or in Argentina. This was the case during my stay where many households consisted at the time of just women, children and grandparents. There are no Mapuche handicrafts left in the community; no one who has been taught to make cheese, weave baskets and blankets or work in silver, in
39 the old traditional way. This knowledge has unfortunately been lost. There is also no machi within the community; I was told that the nearest one is in the community of San Ramón. But there are plans of starting a healthcare centre, which will include traditional healing practices, adjacent to the local school. During my first week in the field, much time was spent with the girls who showed me every inch of the community land. I was taken to see the school, the assembly hall, and the banks of the Alpehue river, but more importantly I got to meet their maternal grandmother who turned out to be indispensable for my study. In her house I also got to know two of their uncles and their families, who also proved to be fountains of information. A few weeks after my arrival in Alpehue, I was introduced to the rest of the community at a well-attended meeting in the local assembly hall. This was a good way of explaining the purpose of my visit to everybody as my staying with the family had caused some people to gossip already. My presence was explained in various ways; I was assumed to be a long lost daughter of Don Artemio (one that does not exist) or the unknown sister of Sra. Alicia (one that does not exist either). The fact that I was a student never seemed to cross anyone’s mind as they were used to receiving a whole bunch of students from Santiago that would then be distributed to several families. The fact that I turned up alone made the situation look a bit mysterious. Anyway, in the community meeting after dealing with topics of general interest; like the initiation of a reforestation project, the importance of vaccinating the honeybees, and the alarming increase of sheep thefts in the area, all the attention was focused on the newcomer, i.e. the visiting anthropology student. My presentation of the study was well met and was followed by a long and heated debate among the community members about the current situation of the Mapuche children. The opinions varied greatly between those who saw
40 a severe deterioration of the children’s cultural knowledge and those who did not see any major harm in the children’s “chilenisation”. The discussion was largely centred on the language issue; do the children, or do they not, speak any Mapudungun at all? The majority was of the opinion that the language is of great importance and that the children may know more than the adults give them credit for. A small group did not see the point in teaching the children Mapudungun, as it is “more important to know Spanish and learn English”, and then there was one man who claimed that the children did not know anything about anything. In the end they all agreed that the study was interesting just because of its focus on the children, and the fact that it made them discuss an important topic that they had not talked about before. Many expressed surprise over that they had not made any plans that included the children in a direct manner, the children were always around but nothing had been done especially for them. One woman stated that, “We just feel the kids are Mapuche because we are... but do they really know what it is to be a Mapuche? To tell you the truth I do not know myself... I just am...” This reflection was confirmed, in more or less the same words, by the rest. Later Don Artemio elaborated on the subject:
We have no courses or things like that, aimed especially at our children and youth. They are of course invited to our meetings and everything we do but it is not often they turn up, some of them maybe but generally very few attend. It might be a sign of general lack of interest... I don’t know.
To call it general lack of interest may be a bit unfair, because I soon found out that the children are interested but maybe not in a direct visible way, like turning up at communal meetings for instance. Instead the children channelled their curiosity of Mapuche culture in other ways.
41 IV. GROWING UP AS A MAPUCHE TODAY The girls’ grandmother and I often had conversations about the current situation for Mapuche children. We would sit in her kitchen, close to the stove, drinking our “mate” and chatting away about the differences between her childhood and growing up today. She often returned to the difficulties imposed on the children as, “They are more influenced by the Chileans and their society today. That makes it harder for them to be Mapuche”. She is of the opinion that the pressures from the outside make the children stray from their traditional culture and in some way to deny it. This made her feel very sad and discouraged about the future of the Mapuche. But none of the children I came in contact with expressed shame in being Mapuche. I was often told that, “We are Mapuche because our parents are. We have never been anything else, and we don’t want to be anything else”. This was also noted by Hilger in the late 1950’s, “Pride in being Araucanian is characteristic of the milieu in which a child grows up, and is, therefore, inherent in the child” (1957: 53). The thing is that the grandmother may have a point when blaming the outside world. In these times of rapid globalisation there is an underlying assumption that all human beings should strive to become the same, that we all should be “modern” and in tuned to the latest technological advances. In the case of the Mapuche this can be seen as a form of threat as their uniqueness is overshadowed by the majority culture’s desire for development and modernisation. But at the same time the globalisation process has proven to be helpful to the Mapuche in other ways; it has opened up new platforms for discussion and made it possible to reach others in the same situation. The meeting of one culture with another can reinforce indigenous traditions and beliefs. But this is, according to Bacigalupo, only possible if the cultural heritage is greatly valued by both societies (2001: 104). The lack of interest in Mapuche culture by the surrounding Chilean society has much to do with the latter’s quest for modernisation. This combined with the fact that
42 national awareness of ethnicity within Chile is not fully developed, has put the Mapuche in a peripheral position. The worsening socio-economic inequality marginalizes the Mapuche even more. The discrimination is based on the notion that Chile, as a “civilised” nation is superior and in no need of the Mapuche traditional customs and values. These are seen as backward or merely as “exotic” in the best of cases. So, all in all I think that growing up as a Mapuche today is made more difficult by the globalisation process. Something similar was expressed by a Mapuche anthropologist I met at a meeting in the community of Juan Meli in Melipeuco. In her chat to the assembled crowd she expressed among other things that, “The civilisation leads our culture to ‘uncivilisation’”. She referred to the Mapuche in general, but I think that the children are especially vulnerable to the outside world and the processes it brings along, whether it is termed globalisation or civilisation. The fact is that the pressure of the outside world leaves the children in a vulnerable position as they are trapped between “the traditional” and “the modern”. They are forced to go through a re-evaluation process where the question of “what is important?” is put on display. This brings about a multidimensional notion of the Self that is reflected in the child assuming different identities in different situations. This awkwardness can be illustrated by something Roxana expressed at the end of a long discussion one afternoon. It all has its root in another difference the grandmother often brought up. That is how the children today refuse to wear the traditional Mapuche clothing. In her childhood all Mapuche women wore the chamal. Now, she complains, “The girls all walk around in trousers. You’re lucky if you see young girls in a chamal at the nguillatun”. In the community she is actually the only one who wears the typical black chamal with the flowery apron on a daily basis. I came into contact with the children’s view on the clothes on several occasions. Many expressed that they do not wear the chamal because it was unfashionable and wearing it would probably make them feel “like a granny”
43 or “like I was wearing a costume to a fancy-dress party”. But some of them, like Roxana, also expressed a more serious objection. The weekend before my arrival an international triathlon-contest descended on the community. They put up a base camp in the field close to the assembly hall, and the otherwise quiet life of the community members was filled with frantic activity as all terrain jeeps, helicopters, hordes of functionaries and athletes from all over Latin America invaded Alpehue. When asked about what they had experienced with all those people around the girls had different opinions. Ayelen had missed the entire thing as she had spent that week in Melipeuco at Don Artemio’s sister’s house. Pirren and Rayen had had a marvellous time witnessing all the commotion and they had also managed to make a considerable amount of money selling cherries and “mote con huesillos” (a traditional Chilean beverage). They also had much fun about the fact that some of the participant teams got completely lost while trekking the mountains, “That is what happens when the winka try to go up our mountains by themselves without a Mapuche to guide them!” While they were telling me about their experiences I noticed that Roxana, in contrast to her two younger sisters, seemed to be unhappy with the event. Her recollection of the weekend was tinged with sadness and anger:
The winka that came treated us like “indios”. They stared at us and went around saying that they had never seen a Mapuche so up-close before... One even photographed Granny without asking. But the worst part was that after he did that, he gave her a worthless Argentinean peso. I hate it when they do that... treat us like animals or stuff belonging in a museum. He asked me why I didn’t dress like Granny, being a Mapuche and all... As if I want to be treated like a curiosity.
Her story became the beginning of a discussion among the girls about the importance of the traditional chamal. The girls all agreed that if they would
44 wear it in the future it would only be in a nguillatun because then “it would only be Mapuche around and we would feel safer knowing that no one would stare”. This example shows that the children, even though they do not deny they are Mapuche, still feel the need to play down their ethnic identity in some situations. They seem not to be prepared to go all the way to show the outside world that they belong to a minority culture, not in a visible way anyway. This also brings thoughts about how the children differentiate between feeling Mapuche on the inside while doing what they can to project a non-Mapuche exterior, like rejecting the traditional clothing for example. This action is further enhanced as the children realise that the expectations on them may differ depending on who is asked. What the parents expect from their children may not always be compatible with the surrounding society’s view on what is important to know in order to get ahead.
General Expectations for Children Late childhood and early adolescence are the prime periods for the formal inculcations of social values. Inkeles claims that this indoctrination is carried through in many ways; specific, explicit and didactic (1969: 627). The socialisation process can be shaped in these ways by different actors; most commonly the child’s parents but also by the society at large.
Every individual, as we encounter him, is the outcome, the ‘product’, in a sense, of a given socialization process. This outcome, ‘successful’ or ‘unsuccessful’ from the perspective of a particular social system in a given time and place, will, in fact, depend on a series of inputs. It will depend on the individual, the persons involved in the socializing, and finally the result of socialization will be shaped by certain more or less fixed or regular aspects of the network of social relations in which the individual lives (Inkeles 1969: 617).
45 This does usually not create any problems as both parents and society often have the same goals and expectations for the child. But in the cases where there is a conflict between what the parents want and what the society want, the socialisation process is made more problematic. This is what I think is the case with the socialisation of Mapuche children. My impression is that their socialisation is made more difficult by the fact that they belong to a minority culture. What I mean is that they are taught traditional knowledge by their parents, knowledge that later turns out not to be appreciated by the surrounding majority culture. This situation is unfortunate as the children might start to question the necessity of the traditional knowledge. The end result that is expected by both parents and society is that the children become “good people”. To be able to reach this generalised ideal most parents are willing to put in as much effort as they can possibly muster. One parental goal is that the child acquires cultural values. This is done mainly by letting the child observe actions of an adult and then repeat it. The idea is to get the child to internalise what has been displayed. Observation is, according to Morton, acknowledged as an important means of acquiring the knowledge required to behave appropriately (1996: 161). The children are also beginning to hear the principles of “right living”. This is achieved by relating folk sayings, proverbs, and fairytales and so on. This is done with the objective to spread the doctrine of the particular culture. Several authors suggest that in many cultures, children are socialised through informal instruction, observation of their elders, and participation in the simpler aspects of an activity as competence develops. Direct tuition is not that common. It is, according to Rogoff, less likely to appear if children can participate in the settings and roles of the adult’s world (1981: 32). The learners can be counted on to do most of the work of socialisation themselves, by watching their elders and gradually become more involved. This includes only the transmission of manual skills because there are some things that
46 needs to be transferred, that are too complex to leave to mere observation and participation. Skill acquisition is, to me anyway, the easiest form of socialisation and can therefore be left to the child to learn by itself. This opinion is in a way shared with Lancy who claims that the burden of skill rests almost totally on the learner (1996: 150). When it comes to abstract issues as morality and solidarity, I get the impression that a more direct form of socialisation is needed. The issue of transmission of morality is treated in a very interesting article by Rydström (2001). She describes how the widely cited metaphor in Vietnam, that the “children are like a white piece of paper” indicates that children need to be imprinted with morality in order to be socialised appropriately (2001: 394). In the case of the Mapuche, the relationships between different generations and between the living and the dead are seen as central motives for proper moral behaviour. These bonds with the older generation and the ancestral spirits are therefore a cornerstone in the socialisation of children. From a very young age the children are expected to honour their grandparents. I could see this reflected in how the four girls always worried about their Granny’s well-being. They all had the habit of taking things with them when they visited. In the cherry-picking season they brought buckets of it to her, in the “piñon” season they prepared a sack full of it for her and so on. This sense of attending to the older generation can also be attributed to other traits that are inculcated in the children, namely, solidarity and reciprocity. I was often told that, “Mapuche solidarity is to share the little that you have”. I came across this notion every time I visited the different homes in the community. Wherever I went, it always presented itself in the fact that I was expected to share a meal. I soon realised that there was no use saying that I had eaten before leaving home, because a couple of minutes after we were done with the formal greetings the table was set. Bread was baked, eggs were
47 fried, and tomatoes were picked from the garden patches. All was made ready for a “mate” session. When I discussed the fact that I felt a bit bad going around eating like that, Sra. Alicia laughed and said:
We may be poor but we are generous. It is important for us to share and give of the little we have. It is just the way we are. But it is a good thing that the distances are long here in the country and that we are forced to walk home from wherever we are visiting. That way we get some exercise out of it as well.
The custom to always offer food to visitors was of course also followed at the host-family’s home. As Don Artemio is the one who handles the community’s contacts with the outside world, the house was often visited by members of various committees and organisations who were interested in the community, whether it was to invite them to meetings or excursions to visit other Mapuche areas, they were always treated with a snack consisting of “mate”, bread and honey. Sra. Alicia was the leader of the community’s women organisation so sometimes the guest would come to see her. Every time a car drove up the alley leading to the house the dogs would bark, Don Artemio and Sra. Alicia would stop whatever they were doing and the girls would turn up instantly from different directions. The visitors would be greeted formally in the yard and then invited to sit on the porch. The conversations between the adults were often followed with great interest by the girls, who would sit in silence and only speak when spoken to. After the visitors had left they always discussed what they had heard with their parents and would often give their opinions about the suggestions made by the visitors. Once the youngest made a complaint about the fact that the visitors had eaten all the cheese that was left. This was the start of another big discussion among the girls as the other three scolded her for being selfish and “sounding like a spoiled winka”.
48 The traits of “good Mapuche behaviour”; morality, solidarity and reciprocity, are instilled in the children when young. They are usually both transferred to, and re-enacted by, the children in the course of their everyday lives.
Children’s Everyday Lives: Socialisation in Context The social context in which children acquire skills and values is, according to Rogoff, receiving increasing attention as researchers attempt to understand the social ecology of children’s everyday learning experiences (1981: 18). And the fact is that the process of knowledge acquisition occurs in the context of children’s everyday lives, in their interaction with kin, their work for the household, their formal education, and their play. During my fieldwork my interest was to exam the details of children’s everyday lives, especially their interactions with each other but also with other members of society. To be able to do this it was necessary for me to follow them around during the days, letting them act and react as they normally do and then ask questions. I tried to do it the other way around at first but I soon realised that the children did not reflect over their relations with other members of the community or over traditional language and religion. But on the other hand, what ‘normal’ ten year old devotes his/her time to philosophy and thoughts about abstract issues, regardless of society? So, it turned out to be easier for everybody to let them lead the conversation and then ask some follow-up questions. As I stated earlier there is usually an absence of direct instruction. So how are the children expected to learn proper behaviour and skills? In many cases they simply learn through observation and imitation. When I came to stay the girls were on their summer vacation from school. The days were spent on almost daily excursions to the riverbank or up the mountainside. From their special lookout place they would point out the
49 boundaries of their fathers’ extensive terrain. During these walks the girls pointed out several herbs that they knew were traditional remedies.
This one over here is really good for when one has a loose stomach. You just make some tea of it and drink and you are ok afterwards. My mother gives us this. I don’t know the name but it is for when you... you know... go to the bathroom a lot! And those leaves are brilliant. When you’ve cut yourself and there is blood all over the place you chew these leaves a bit and then put it on the cut and it stops bleeding right away. It’s true, I’m not joking!
The girls had the habit of collecting all kinds of leaves, berries, nuts and roots that they later showed their mother for closer inspection. She often praised the girls for their findings and proceeded to tell them about the plants herbal uses. The Mapuche often use varying kinds of medicinal herbs as infusions. The different herbs have medicinal properties but also symbolic and spiritual properties (Bacigalupo 2001: 77; see also Gumucio 1999). The more intricate knowledge of plant taxonomy belongs exclusively to the machi, who by their oral and sonic therapy resolves problems, illnesses and pains (Bacigalupo 2001: 10). The machi, as a healer and shaman, is highly respected by the Mapuche. Their knowledge is sacred and passed on to those in the younger generation that have been “called or summoned” to fulfil that role by either heritage, a natural disaster or a special kind of vision or a peuma (ibid.: 29). The peuma are conceptualised as places for visits from spirits and deities. It is one of the most common and important experiences in the life of the Mapuche as it is considered a usual way of spiritual communication. The dreams are, according to Bacigalupo, seen as a way for the ancestors and spirits to express themselves, but also a way to guide the behaviour of the Mapuche and to instigate the traditional practices (2001: 52). Even though the knowledge of a machi is specialised, many Mapuche have some sort of basic knowledge of herbal plants and what they are good
50 for. This is the case with Sra. Alicia who knows and uses some plants as herbal remedies. Sometimes the girls themselves asked about the remedies but more often enough this knowledge was passed when some accident happened and Sra. Alicia’s actions were closely studied by her daughters. I was told that the knowledge of the ”blood stopping leaves” was acquired at one such occasion when Pirren had fallen off her bike and ended up with a nasty cut on her knee. Sra. Alicia had remedied this with the help of the leaves. The knowledge of the leaves’ function was thus passed in an informal, but visually direct way as the girls had not expressly asked to be taught in traditional herbal medicine. Our walks took place in the afternoons because the time before lunch was usually spent working. Ayelen and Pirren helped their mother in the garden patch or feeding the chicken while Roxana and Rayen worked alongside their father with the harvesting of cereal, chopping wood or extracting honey from the beehives. Some work was made together by the four girls, like the vaccinating of the beehives and the eternal chasing of the sheep in the evenings. This latter task was something of a struggle as the girls usually left it until too late in the evening when the dusk was already upon them. The fact that the darkness of the night fell so quickly surprised me every time. One minute the sun was setting and the next it was pitch black. This made, of course, the search for the wandering sheep even more problematic. Many evenings were spent stumbling around in the dark, clapping furiously and yelling out directions among us in order to corral the stubborn sheep and force them to return to their pen. The different tasks the girls had assigned to them by their parents were based mainly on their age and maturity level. As they did not have any brothers, the older ones were expected to do the more “manly” chores based on strength and perseverance, while the younger ones were given more room to play and fool around. Their chores were done after receiving more direct
51 instructions from Sra. Alicia as they had a tendency to just wander off otherwise. They were also supervised more directly, while Roxana and Rayen were trusted to do their work without Don Artemio’s continuing guidance. The older girls never seemed to question their assignments like the younger did. Instead they often scolded their sisters saying:
What are you complaining about? You do the easiest work because you are the little ones. Don’t you see that we started out doing that stuff as well and we did not complain. Just wait until you’re old enough and daddy tells you to cut the grass…
At one occasion we all had to go and help out at one of Don Artemio’s elderly relatives. We spent all afternoon making bundles of the harvested wheat that we later put on a wooden cart. A tractor usually this, but this time it had not turned up from Melipeuco. We were told that the volcano “Llaima has announced bad weather for two days already so it is extremely important to gather all the wheat before the rain”. This work was done without any questioning as all the girls knew it was expected of them based on all traits described earlier, i.e. morality, solidarity and reciprocity.
It was daddy’s uncle who needed our help. He is older and we must show respect. We cannot refuse for it might bring problems for us. No, not with our daddy but bigger problems… with ourselves because we would know that we had made something wrong, that we would have let down someone older. That would be really bad.
All the girls seem to have internalised the basic traits of their culture, when it comes to “good behaviour”. The girl’s internalisations of other elements of the Mapuche culture, those that separate the Mapuche as an ethnic group are dealt with in the following chapters.
52 V. LANGUAGE AND RELIGION AS ETHNIC MARKERS All the norms shared by a group create recognition and safety, and are therefore necessary in human social interaction. At the same time, these norms, a shared feeling of what is normal, transforms other people to strangers that are not quite like us. The separation between Self and Other is therefore not only applicable in the individual sense as it also appears in a more generalised sense, like between different groups. The interaction between the groups helps to shape the groups internal identification. When talking of the Mapuche and the surrounding Chilean society, Bacigalupo is of the opinion that, “Mapuche identity, culture and tradition, as well as the Chilean, are dynamic and emerges in dialogue, in contraposition and identification with the Other” (2001: 9). A successful socialisation helps to create unity on a group level. This unity is reflected in the fact that the group shares a metaknowledge. The metaknowledge of the group is, according to Wellros, represented in that the members of the group view different symbols in the same way (1998: 18). Their behaviour follows unwritten rules and they use the same principles for creating logical connections and a sense of order. All societies use instruments to facilitate the socialisation of the child, some of these are language, written and unwritten behavioural norms, values, relationships and hierarchies. They are used as tools to create structure in both outer surroundings and within the individuals’ minds. Tools like language and religion are also used to mark off an ethnic group from another. Generally, social identity is most valuable when it appears threatened. This threat can be devised by many different factors but they are, according to Hylland-Eriksen, always connected to some kind of change. Examples of these changes are; migration, demographic change, economic change, or integration into a larger political system (1993: 89). All these changes mentioned by Hylland-Eriksen were imposed on the Mapuche through the reservation system. As both the
53 political and economic structures were exposed to pressure it became important to find other ways to maintain their ethnic boundary. According to Hylland-Eriksen, many ethnic groups justify their unity by a notion of a shared origin and a common religion. But at the same time he argues that it is not enough to say that an ethnic group is distinguished by a common culture, or to point out specific traits like common language, religion or customs. This is because, he feels that the cultural boundaries do not necessarily coincide with the ethnic boundaries (Hylland-Eriksen 1993: 47f). But in the case of the Mapuche the boundaries for the culture are more or less the same as the boundaries for their ethnic group. In spite of the desolation left by the reservation years, the Mapuche culture, now a subculture of Chile, continues to be a very distinctive ethnic entity. How have they managed to maintain a distinct social and cultural identity after all these changes to their corporate structure? This is, according to Hylland-Eriksen, possible when a group has access to an ethnic symbolism that refers to either an old language or kinship system, or to an old religion or lifestyle (1993: 89). To be a Mapuche in Chile is to be one of those who display certain vaguely common cultural and psychological characteristics. These are explained by Barth, who states that the cultural contents of an ethnic unit are of two orders; (1) visual signals and signs: these are the features that people look for and exhibit to show identity, for example dress, language, house-form, or general style of life, and (2) basic value orientations: the standards of morality and excellence by which performance is judged (1969: 14). Barth states that the features that are most important are those, which the actors themselves regard as significant (1969: 14). In conversations with my informants it was generally agreed upon that knowledge of the traditional language, the Mapudungun, and of the traditional religion is vital to being a Mapuche. They are viewed as important tools when defining the group and are thus transmitted to the younger generation as a way
54 to secure the future of the Mapuche. This might seem as a very straightforward and easy task; to transmit the group’s culture to its newest members. But if this culture belongs to a minority group this process is made more difficult as the dominant group does not always acknowledge their culture. The integration of an ethnic minority may be seen as an aspect of the development of a nation, but it always involves a serious threat to the social, political and economic structure of the group concerned. This process does not necessarily lead to the physical disappearance of the group, but national integration usually means that the minority that is being integrated has its own culture broken down (Berglund 1977: 88). Dentan also encounters this situation, when looking at the Semai. They continue to integrate into Malaysian society as they have always done, becoming more and more like Malays, though they continue to define Semai as opposite to Malays. But their children increasingly refuse to speak their traditional language and are now shifting to speaking Malay. Dentans’ informants say it is because the children regard the vernacular as “the language of the poor and pathetic people” (2001: 96). This is the view of the language shift by the older generation of Semai. It is in many ways similar to the one of the older Mapuche I came into contact with. The Mapuche population and territory are much smaller today than in pre-colonial and colonial times, but the Mapudungun is still spoken, especially among the older people, who rarely speak Spanish. Mapuche ethnic specificity has not been granted any degree of official recognition. Mapuche children have to learn Spanish, the only language learned at school. They therefore face language difficulties and the Mapuche language is in danger of extinction as a result of these deliberate policies of the public authorities. Schieffelin and Ochs claim that language in use is a major tool for conveying socio-cultural knowledge and a powerful medium of socialisation. They suggest that children acquire a worldview as they acquire a language
55 (1986: 3). Halliday also considers language as a way to define and consolidate the group, to include and to exclude, showing who ‘is one of us’ and who is not (1975: 58). This idea is followed by Morton who observes that children are socialised through language; but they are also socialised to use language. She sees this process of language socialisation as crucial in the development of the children’s social and cultural identities (1996: 162). Trevarthen seems to share this opinion. He concludes that persons have mastery of meaning; in language, in traditional beliefs, in customary co-operative actions and in the accepted perception of the artificial tools, institutions and rituals that they use together. This is cognition in the anthropological sense – the working knowledge of a culture, especially talk about that knowledge and hence the store of meanings in words. Children must learn the skill and “sense” of culture as they learn to talk. Cognition as anthropologists defines it, is historically created, and absorbed by every new generation with the language (1988: 38-39). But what happens when the worldview and consequently the socio- cultural identity, is intimately connected to a traditional language, and that language is being lost due to pressures from the outside world? If the situation is one of decreasing knowledge of the Mapudungun among the Mapuche children, what does this mean for the survival of the Mapuche as an ethnic group? The importance of the Mapudungun, and the place it has in the creation of Mapuche ethnic identity springs from the word itself. The word Mapudungun literally means “the matter of the territory”. The term insists on the character of the vernacular as autochthonous, in opposition to the Spanish that came from abroad, brought by foreigners. Dungun stands for the talk of the people, the vocalisation of animals and the noises made by things, while Mapu stands for the land or territory. Before the conquest the Mapuche had no reason to distinguish their language as theirs was the only one that existed
56 within their territory. The Mapuche were humanity in total, and their language was the language of mankind. They only needed to distinguish it from the grunts of the animals and the noises of things. The term Mapudungun is thus a modern denomination produced by the need to contrast the vernacular tongue from the foreign Spanish (Salas 1992: 57f). Hence, the Mapudungun is spoken by the humans, within the Mapuche group. So, if this is taken further, it means that those who do not speak it are no longer members of the human group. The Mapudungun is therefore not seen as just a language, it is the very factor that distinguishes the human from an animal or a thing. The situation of the Mapudungun could be seen as worrying but my view is that the bad situation is turning and that things are looking up. The children have not chosen to abandon the language all together. Instead they internalise it in a different manner. This thesis is about one such community where the traditional language of the Mapuche is slowly disintegrating. The children in the community seem to have a minor knowledge of the language and the local school does not provide teaching in the ancestral language. The issue of bilingual schooling is going to be addressed more thoroughly in chapter eight. So, even though the language is perceived as playing a major part in their ethnic consciousness, the children speak primarily Spanish. The traditional religion on the other hand is living a process of revitalisation. The children’s knowledge of it has an opportunity to increase now that the community have taken up the tradition to stage the nguillatun. The importance of the traditional religion was often mentioned as I was told that:
Our religion and is the foundation for our existence, if we know it; we are better prepared to stand up for our rights as indigenous people.
57 The different situations for these two ethnic markers so vital for the Mapuche are going to be dealt with in the next two chapters.
VI. THE IMPORTANCE OF MAPUDUNGUN The Mapudungun is the language of the ancestors, and it has strong associations with the group and its territory. To have good knowledge of the Mapudungun is therefore considered to be an essential part of being Mapuche. The majority of the parents I talked to expressed that they wanted their children to speak Mapudungun. But the fact is that no community child under the age of fifteen actively used the language in verbal interactions. However, this does not in any way prove that it can be established with certainty that the children in the Andrés Huenupi community no longer learn the traditional language. Instead they all seem to harbour an interest to someday in the future speak the language of the ancestors. So, even though these children express themselves mainly in Spanish, most of them appear to understand Mapudungun. My feeling is that as long as the children have not expressly decided to abandon the Mapudungun there is still a chance that they could become bilingual one day. But that is if they receive support for their wishes from their parents, because if the parents take the decision to not teach the children then the learning process is made even more difficult. When referring to the language shift among the people of Gapun, a small village in Papua New Guinea, Kulick asserts that,
Throughout the literature, parents are either portrayed as having consciously and explicitly decided not to teach their children their own vernacular or (...) reported to decide not to encourage their children to learn the vernacular, even if they continue to use it among themselves. Usually the reasons underlying such a decision are said to have to do precisely with their opinions about the relative prestige of the vernacular in relation to a language of wider
58 currency; i.e., parents consider that their children “don’t need” to learn the vernacular to get by in society or they are concerned that the child’s school language might suffer if he or she speaks the vernacular, etc. (1992: 12).
This was expressed in my first meeting with the community when some parents said straight out that it is more necessary for the children to learn English than Mapudungun. Parental decisions and wishes are of course an important factor that influences a child’s language acquisition. But it is also important to keep in mind that there are other factors. Older siblings may, for example, play a major role in the language acquisition of their younger brothers and sisters. They may, according to Kulick, have great significance for whether these children become bilingual, semi-speakers or monolingual in the majority language (1992: 13). The issue of sibling socialisation was in many ways present among the host-family’s girls. They influenced each other in many ways; some very subtle, other more direct. They all had different opinions of how the language should be handled, how important it was, but their own knowledge of it varied greatly. I cannot say with certainty, which one of them knows more, but they all have different approaches in how to use what they do know. Many of their discussions about Mapudungun occurred when doing ordinary chores or while playing. The first debate arose one afternoon after we had been in the fields collecting corn and potatoes. We had also managed to find some of the remaining peas in the garden-patch in front of the house. As we sat in the shade, pealing and chopping the vegetables the conversation turned into the language issue, as the girls could not agree on the correct name for corn in Mapudungun. When asked what languages are important to know and learn, a heated argument ensued between the older girls.
59 - I want to study English. I mean that is what I have at school, and I like it. It is important. With the Mapuche I don’t know. There is no use for it... really. It’s not that important... not for me anyway... - No no no. I think we should learn both. - Both?! - Yes, both Mapuche and English. Why do you say it is not important? Don’t be stupid! It is! We are Mapuche, not winka. We must know both! - Why?! And don’t say that I’m stupid. - Because we are Mapuche, they are equally important. You should not say it does not mean anything to you. It is not right! Take that back! - Well... I also want to learn both… I was just kidding around... I guess Mapuche is important too...
The calmness of the afternoon was disturbed as Roxana and Rayen clearly had different opinions, because even though Roxana finally agreed to the importance of knowing Mapudungun, Rayen was not that convinced that she actually meant it. The argument continued for a while until it was punctuated by Pirren who, from her position under the table, put an end to the discussion when she stated that, “We are Mapuche, we speak Mapuche!” I often heard statements like these, that affirmed the need to speak Mapudungun, but there seemed to be a discrepancy in the expressed wishes to learn and the actual interest in learning. When asked who would teach them, the girls answered that their parents would, but in the occasions where the parents made an effort to teach them, the girls always seemed to find something more interesting to do. The youngest often felt the desire to ride the bike at that precise moment while the older girls just took off in different directions claiming they were busy. Both parents are bilingual and especially Don Artemio takes time to explain the language to the girls. He often put on different tapes with language courses and made the girls repeat the words after the tapes. The tapes went through the basics as for example, the numbers, the colours, the kinship terms,
60 topography etc. The girls often sat and listened to the tapes for a while, but soon they got bored and wandered of. When the father pointed out that it was not he who needed to learn as he already knew, the girls often mumbled something about, “taking classes some other day...” When the issue of bilingual school education was discussed the girls thought it was a good idea but had difficulties believing that something like that would be possible in their respective schools as, “All our teachers are winka, and do not know Mapuche. So how would they teach us?” When I suggested that the school could hire Mapuche teachers that would give all the interested children lessons in Mapudungun they looked incredulously at me and asked if I thought it would work at all. In the case of the four girls they have the advantage of hearing Mapudungun at home. They have the opportunity to listen to it all the time and have the chance to receive tutoring the day they express that they want it. So, when the school system fails in providing bilingual education for the children, the parental support becomes quite important in the language socialisation process. But I met examples of the contrary as well, cases where the desire to learn was so great that it fell on the person in question to find support in every way possible. One of their cousins on Don Artemio’s side is in his early twenties and more militant in his defence of his ethnic identity. His parents are not that interested in conserving their traditional culture and as a consequence neither of them knows Mapudungun. Instead it was often the boy who showed more firmness in his desire to immerse himself in his native culture. In the afore- mentioned meeting that took place in the Juan Meli community, the boy held a long speech where he often returned to his sorrow over the fact that he was not able to make the speech in Mapudungun. His monologue was listened to very carefully by the attending lonko. Many of them later returned to the issues
61 raised by the boy when they assured that they would see to that the children in their respective communities would receive help to learn Mapudungun. As the boy did not have the possibility of learning the language from home and bilingual education was not given in the local school where he had attended, he had made other arrangements for himself. He had recently started a course in Mapudungun at a University in nearby Temuco and practiced what he learned with his uncle, the girls’ father. When I asked Don Artemio what he thought about the fact that the boy had to make all these efforts to learn Mapudungun he expressed both joy and sadness:
I am very proud that he is struggling to learn our language. It shows that he respects our culture and does not feel ashamed of being one of us. He has taken a stand... which is more than I could say for his parents... As parents it is our duty to teach Mapudungun to our children, to give them the language of our people. It is important and should not be forgotten. I will help my nephew to learn our language whenever he wants.
The boy’s Spanish was laced with words in Mapudungun and according to Don Artemio this habit had increased in recent times. He was of the opinion that the use of random words would give way to a more integral notion of the traditional language. He also considered it a good way of replacing one language with the other, at least in the beginning because later on the languages would work separately and the boy would truly become bilingual.
The use of random words The fact is that all four girls understand some Mapudungun, it is noticeable in their reactions to their parents comments; “She just said that I have smelly feet!”, “That’s not fair, to tell me that I eat too much!”, “No, that’s not true. I
62 never said that about her!” But none of them actually speaks it fluently. Usually their Spanish was pierced with random words in Mapudungun. Whenever one of them used some, Don Artemio would encourage her and answer in Mapudungun. Long answers that often left the girls a bit bewildered and confused but sometimes they could follow his train of thought and answer back, but then it would be in Spanish. Don Artemio would then continue his discussion in Mapudungun as if nothing had happened. The rest of the girls would fall about laughing while the one who suffered this treatment would exclaim something like, “Oh, my Lord. Daddy’s gone all Mapuche on me now!” This mixing of languages could sometimes lead to fierce discussions between the sisters. Ayelen, for example, counted the playing cards in Mapudungun, that is until she mixed it up or got tired of it and rapidly switched to Spanish and then after a while, back to Mapudungun again. Her sisters often accused her of doing this for the sake of cheating and told her to decide one language and then stick to it. This way they could all keep track of the counting, whether it was in Spanish or Mapudungun. Ayelen also had the habit of never saying the Spanish word for yes, instead she always answered mai. When I asked her why she didn’t say no in Mapudungun, she told me that the simple reason for it was that she just didn’t know how to. One of their maternal uncles always used to say the numbers in Mapudungun when speaking to the girls, as he was of the opinion that, “They should at least start somewhere. And what would be easier than with the numbers?” At one occasion he asked Rayen to go and look for the sheep and to count them to check that none had strayed. She was told to look out for epu mari epu sheep. The girl went off and at her return she told him that they were all there. He proceeded to ask how many they actually were:
63 - How many did you count? - You told me to look out for twenty-two sheep, and I did. They are all there. - No, I did not say twenty-two. I said epu mari epu. - But that is exactly the same, isn’t it? Twenty-two and epu mari epu... - Yes, I know. I just wanted to hear you say it in Mapuche.
Conversations like these were often engaged with the girls as the surrounding adults taught them the language by a combination of teasing and gentle coercion. This method of language socialisation was not always appreciated by the girls who often expressed annoyance at what they considered to be a form of trickery and ridicule. They felt that, “it’s just a way to laugh at us because we don’t know it as good as them…”. But I soon found out that this method was only disapproved of, if it was employ by someone other than Don Artemio or Sra. Alicia. One thing I soon realised was that the girls often spoke of the animals in Mapudungun; “Has anyone seen the blue bowl for the trewa?”, “You’ll never guess what happened! We stumbled across a filkun when we were looking for firewood”, “That tree is no good. It is full of coyaya, and they can bite really hard”, “Did you know that the week before you arrived a trapial killed one of daddy’s sheep?” and so on. These examples are of the straightforward kind as one Spanish word is simply replaced by its equivalent in Mapudungun. But their handling of the languages could sometimes lead to a rather unusual vocabulary where they could mix Spanish and Mapudungun in the most unexpected ways. The best example of this came one evening when I was helping Pirren with her homework. She had been told to read and learn a short fable about a little ant so that she would be able to recite it the following day in class. The task I had been assigned in this case was to listen and correct her when necessary. Trouble started before we even got through the title of the story, “La
64 hormiguita Pancracia” (The little ant Pancracia). Pirren took a deep breath and read, “La coyayita Pancracia...” When I pointed out that it in fact said “hormiguita” she demanded to see the text. She looked at it for a while and said, “This is wrong, it is about a coyayita”. Even though it expressly said little ant in Spanish she continued to say “coyayita”, a non-existing word as the correct term for little ant in Mapudungun would be pichi coyaya. Her made-up word “coyayita” is a combination of coyaya in Mapudungun and the Spanish ending “-ita” that is used when one wants to refer to a diminutive. This proves that she has some sort of bilingualism, as she is able to juggle two languages even though the results sometimes turned out a bit funny. Her attempts to mix the languages show that she is interested in keeping both languages alive. This knowledge was not always acknowledged by the older generation. One of the girls’ cousins on the maternal side, a 15 year old boy, has been brought up by their grandmother, who mostly speaks Mapudungun. He has an almost perfect understanding of the language, and has therefore no trouble communicating with the grandmother but he usually answers her in Spanish. It is very seldom he speaks Mapudungun at all. This was an issue that concerned the surrounding adults a little but they all agreed when asked, that they would continue to communicate with the boy in Mapudungun because it was important that he did not forget the language. Don Artemio often pointed out the fact that the boy actually spoke better Mapudungun than him due to his upbringing at the grandmother’s house. The fact that he did not want to speak it was attributed to his age where “You’re supposed to feel embarrassed over almost everything”. The important thing was that the boy should not be allowed to forget the language because if he did, he might regret it in the future. A few days before I terminated my field study and left Alpehue the boy had also left. His mother who lived in Santiago wanted him to come and stay with her while coursing the last years
65 of school. This provoked strong feelings within the family, as they feared the boy would “forget that he is a Mapuche in the city”. Especially the grandmother who was used to having him around since he was a small boy was critical towards the decision taken by her daughter.
The city is hurtful to us Mapuche. We are discriminated against and stared at as we have no value. They call us “indios” and laugh at our ways. The Mapuche are from the earth and should stay near the earth, the land where we have always lived, the city is bad and I fear that he would become a “gringo” and forget about us… his people.
There was a consensus in the family about the 15 year old boy’s bilingualism but the opinions over how much the four girls understood of the language varied. At one occasion Roxana got very upset when the grandmother expressed the view that the children nowadays do not know Mapudungun. In a conversation carried out in her kitchen the grandmother complained about the girls’ lack of knowledge:
We are all “paisanas”. They are “paisanas”. I am “paisana”. They should speak “paisano” to me. But they just don’t know! And that is the problem with our culture; it won’t survive because the children are not interested in learning our ways, our language. It is sad, very sad...
When I suggested that the children know more than the adults give them credit for, the grandmother disagreed claiming that none of the girls knew Mapudungun. Our conversation was overheard by Roxana who complained to her parents later on in the evening. She was annoyed by the fact that the grandmother had claimed that they did not understand when she felt that by her actions she clearly demonstrated that she had understood her
66 grandmother’s instructions in Mapudungun. The mother smiled and asked what it was the grandmother had wanted her to do. Roxana explained that she had been asked to make kofke; the mother gave two or three varied sentences in Mapudungun about making bread. The girl listened carefully and acknowledged the right one with a triumphant:
That is what she said and so I made the dough... And then Granny wanted me to feed the trewa because she was feeling a bit ill so she had not had the strength to feed it herself. She said that the poor trewa had been starving since breakfast. How would I know all that if I didn’t understand? So, you see, I do understand Mapuche!
In this specific occasion Roxana could argue that she in fact had understood her grandmother but in other cases the grandmother was proved right in her assumption that the girls did not know the language. On one occasion Ayelen was given instructions in Mapudungun by her grandmother. The girl did not understand any of it and just stared at her grandmother clearly bewildered and confused. The grandmother repeated what she had said but the girl still seemed a bit lost. As no one of her sisters was around she had to fend for herself and it was not going very well at all. The grandmother lost her patience and exclaimed:
It is no use. The girl is a chiñurra. The girls do not speak “paisano”. It is sad but the worse thing is that I don’t really see a way out of it…
When I asked Ayelen how she felt when she heard her grandmother refer to the girls in that manner, she shrugged, smiled and said:
I may not know much right now, but I will learn. Granny always says that we don’t know but I’m sure Roxana or Rayen would get
67 what she said to me in Mapuche. I’ll just go and fetch one of them and they will know and tell me what to do. I’m not worried because I know my parents will teach me one day.
The language issue is complicated in the community, as the generations are very far apart in their understanding and knowledge of the Mapudungun. Their views on how much the children actually know are varied and prone to spark a great deal of debate. When it comes to the children’s knowledge of traditional religion I got the impression that their attendance in the rituals was seen by both adults and children as way to get acquainted to the beliefs in a direct but also quite playful manner.
VII. THE VIEW ON TRADITIONAL RELIGION How much does a child actually understand of religion? It might seem a bit unfair to put the children on the spot, so to speak, as many adults do not seem to have a deeper knowledge of it either. My intention here is to see if the children in any way reflect over their own and others religious actions, but also if they internalise what they see and hear, and if that is the case, in what way do they do this? Religion is in this thesis seen only as a part of the children’s ethnic identity. What I mean is that I will discuss it as an aspect of the children’s symbolic capital and will thus not go deeper into the meaning of religion. The Mapuche religion has, ever since the Spanish colonisation, been seen as pagan and backwards. I was often told by members of the older generation that, when they attended catholic schools when younger, the priests often punished them for speaking Mapudungun but they also told them that their religion was the work of the devil and that it was comprised of witchcraft and
68 black magic. Nowadays the situation is different as the Catholic Church seems to have turned a blind eye to the traditional religion as long as the Mapuche turn up at Sunday mass as well. This was precisely the situation in the Andrés Huenupi community. Their assembly hall was used for Catholic mass once a month when the priest from Melipeuco came to give them absolution. The majority of the community attended just as they attended the Mapuche nguillatun when they had the chance. Don Artemio also went to mass but only when it came to him, i.e. one Sunday a month. That was considered enough, and he often said that he only did it to “put in presence” and to accompany Sra. Alicia. Because when push comes to shove he knows which religion is closest to his heart. Don Artemio often reflected over the Mapuche and the hold the Catholic Church has on them, but also what this could lead to in the future. When asked about the religion of Mapuche children, he was of the opinion that it resembled the situation with the language issue. The schools have taken to give the children education in Spanish and catholic faith and it was therefore up to the parents to teach the children “the Mapuche way”; the Mapudungun and the ancestral religion. His daughters have managed to create their own version of the two different religions as they combine parts of both. This is done in an unconscious way as they actually never seem to reflect over the fact that they are indeed mixing two religions. They do not, for example, make a distinction between God in mass and Ngenechen in the nguillatun. Actions from one religion are mixed with rituals from the other and so on. Rayen, for example, is very determined in her wishes to build a rewe. At one occasion she pointed out a spot beside the house, close to the clothes line and argued:
Granny has a rewe in her garden patch. We should have one as well. It is important, isn’t it? We could put it over here... don’t you agree? Daddy, we must get one. How could you otherwise know a Mapuche family lives here?
69 She is at the same time the one who sings along the loudest to the catholic hymns on the radio while sweeping the dining room at the weekends. This syncretism between traditional Mapuche religion and the Catholic faith is generally not seen as a problem as a combination of both seems to be more than possible. The mixing of both religions seems to work out for both children and adults alike. In conversations a generalised feeling emerged, that is best explained by something a lonko from another community told me once:
The Mapuche religion flows in our veins since the day we are born while the catholic faith is something one has got accustomed to during the years. Both are equally important I guess but our religion as Mapuche, is given to us by our ancestors and cannot be replaced by another or we would not be Mapuche at all.
One clear example of the mixing of religions came on one of my first days at the host-family’s home, when I became a witness to an amazing display of a child’s religious action. The action itself is from the traditional religion, while the term for God, “Dios” or in the child’s language “Diosito” (little God), is from the Catholic faith. We were sitting on the porch drinking juice when Pirren stood up and walked to the precise spot where Rayen a couple of days earlier had pointed out the location for the rewe. She proceeded to pour some juice to the ground and when she returned to the table she said:
I had almost forgotten that it is important to give “Diosito” a little to drink. I guess it is even more important on a hot day like this. Now that I have done it, “Diosito” will watch over us and protect us.
70 While I was completely taken aback by her action, her sister Ayelen guffawed. When she had finished laughing she told Pirren that you are supposed to pour little of your drink on the ground before you drink yourself, “First God then you. You just tossed out your juice because you’re full and don’t want it anymore... I don’t think God likes it if you give him leftovers”. The older girls soon joined in the brewing fight. Roxana supported the youngest one saying that it is the thought that counts, while the two in the middle protested loudly and yelled something about, “If you’re going to do something you have to it right or otherwise you’ll never know what would happen”. The discussion continued for a while until Don Artemio was called on to give his verdict. He looked sternly on all the girls and said they were all correct, because even though you are supposed to do it the way Rayen and Ayelen said, it was only Pirren who had remember God at all and Roxana was right to assume that God does not mind so much if you mess up a little as long as you with actions show that you care. I realised quite soon that even though the girls usually did not distinguish between Catholicism and Mapuche religion there were some elements that they clearly knew belonged to the latter. This was, for example, the case with the forces of evil, the wekufe and the kalku. One day when we were on our way to meet Don Artemio and Roxana at the crossing of the road to Alpehue with the one to Cumcumllaque we stumbled upon an example of the darker sides of the traditional religion, namely a sign of witchcraft. Sra. Alicia was riding ahead of us; Rayen, Ayelen, Pirren, myself and our trusty gang of companions, the family dogs. We had already been covered with dust a couple of times by the cars that had driven by. The girls were complaining loudly about the fact that none of the cars had stopped to offer us a ride when we noticed that Sra. Alicia had turned back the horse and was coming towards us. Then she suddenly stopped at one of the neighbours’ gate
71 and waited for us. The girls immediately figured out something was wrong because there was no reason for her to wait for us as we all knew the way to the crossing. When we were within earshot she pointed at a plastic bag by the road and warned us not to go near as it was filled with black magic that would probably attach itself to the first person that touched it. When the girls wanted to know what was in the bag we were told it contained some dead flowers and some burned candles. We all looked at each other with surprise and confusion but were soon startled by a loud shriek. It was Pirren who yelled at one of the dogs because he had run to sniff the insides of the bag. Her sisters assured her that witchcraft probably did not apply to animals but the girl was not convinced and kept on admonishing the dog. We started to walk again as we discussed the bag and who could have put it there and more importantly, why someone had felt the need to turn to witchcraft.
It must have been a winka that wanted to hurt us Mapuche. That is what the winka do. They call on the wekufe to do harm to us Mapuche. They put bad stuff in a bag and leave it by the road hoping a Mapuche will come and touch it. It was a winka... I’m sure of it.
Pirren had already made up her mind, clearly blaming a non-Mapuche of this wrongful deed. Rayen tried to convince her that it was not the case as, “How would the winka know of Mapuche witchcraft?” One could tell Pirren was upset as she thought about the logic of her older sister’s reasoning while kicking up gravel. We walked in silence for a while until Rayen spoke again. This time it was only she and I as the younger girls had run ahead.
Besides, do you really think the winka know of the wekufe? The Chileans in general don’t know much about us Mapuche. They don’t teach us about the Mapuche in school even though the majority of us are Mapuche. Once our teacher asked a boy in class where the Mapuche live. He answered that all the Mapuche he
72 knew lived at home... It was quite funny actually but the teacher sent a note to his parents. The boy is our neighbour and related to us in some weird way. I guess he too was annoyed with stupid questions... I mean we know where we live, we all knew she wanted us to respond the region of Araucania but we know that, we need to know other important stuff about the Mapuche. All I know, I was told by my parents and Granny... that goes for my sisters as well. It is them I turn to when I want to know something... but usually I just sit around listening and I will pick up things that are important. Things about how it was before and how the Mapuche have lived here always and how the Chileans pushed us away...
The children’s reactions to this incident brought together several issues centred on religious matters and the identification with the Mapuche as an ethnic group; the immediate blame that was put on a winka, the mentioning of the wekufe, the expressed feeling of historical discrimination. The incident was later discussed by the dinner table, especially the end of the story was considered by the younger girls to be particularly scary. The thing is that on our way back from meeting up with Don Artemio and Roxana the witchcraft had its unexpected result. The dog that had been the only one to approach the bag was unfortunately stepped on by the horse. This had never happened before as the dogs knew not to get too close to the horse, but in this occasion the dog had managed to get trapped between the horses’ feet and stepped on. The shrieking of the injured dog alarmed everybody, especially Pirren who after seeing the limping dog cried angry tears all the way home. I do not think anybody in the family managed to really convince her that the dog had not fallen victim to the machinations of an “evil winka”. This part of the traditional religion was not that understandable to the girls but other elements of it was considered to be more interesting and agreeable. One feature of traditional religion the girls all seemed to enjoy was to take part in the community ritual, the nguillatun.
73 Participating in a Nguillatun The nguillatun as an agricultural fertility ritual is held on large open fields, generally in the pre-harvest season. Its main aim is to supplicate the supernatural powers to insure the production of crops, animals, and the prosperity and well being of the Mapuche. The nguillatun can also be held in the post-harvest season to show gratitude, to ask for continued protection from the forces of evil, and sometimes to register complaints concerning poor crops or the loss of animals. It also serves to unite the Mapuche before Ngenechen and their ancestors. The Mapuche are among the peoples who centre their life on a “cosmic mountain”. This is Sullivan’s term for the mythical notion of a world mountain at the centre of the world (1988: 132). He continues by saying that this cosmic mountain is perceived as the highest point of the universe and the birthplace of the entire creation (ibid.: 132). In the case of the Mapuche, the top of the mountain is the home of Ngenechen, who is often referred to as “the first being and the creator”. This is a somewhat simplified explanation, because it is quite problematic to describe Ngenechen as it is perceived more of an impersonal force than an entity. Its presence is felt in the relationship between, for example; good – evil, light – dark, sacred – profane, life – death. These fields are charged with spiritual force, and it is the flow of differences between them that is seen as Ngenechen. The same argument can be found in Gumucio (1999), who states that, “(...) the force of the divine is not to be found so much in certain beings as in the relations that are seen to permeate the whole cosmos” (1999: 54). Ngenechen is accessible only through the special category of sacred prayers and songs that are performed ritually in the nguillatun. The relationship between Ngenechen and his children, the Mapuche, is seen as benevolent, and is like the relationship between the Mapuche, based on a balanced reciprocity (Bacigalupo 2001: 16).
74 The ritual rest on lineage-based obligations but involve the attendance of non- related groups: the host group and the guests, taken together, comprise the ritual congregation. A major concern of the congregation during any ritual assemblage is counteracting the forces of evil, collectively called wekufe, and the human embodiment of evil, the sorcerer-witch who is called kalku. The person who is most intimately concerned with restraining evil and who is most competent to perform on behalf of the living is the nguillatufe or ritual priest, who represents the people (Faron 1961: 212). The first day of the nguillatun is considered very sacred, and much time is given to the propitiation of ancestors of the host group and to those of the participating communities. The ideal for the ritual is of course a full performance. This means, in this case, that the nguillatun is celebrated during two or four days. After the initial prayer, the nguillatufe signals for the performance of awun, this clears the ceremonial field of any lurking forces of evil (Foerster 1993: 93). This is done by men on horses, who gallop around the perimeter of the field. They ride around several times, ideally four times or a multiple of four. The more horsemen available make the awun more effective. While this is happening around the field, a communal dance called purun begins around the sacred central point. As the awun encirclement, the purun is also danced counter clockwise. They are both accompanied by music, mostly played on pifülka, trutruka, and kultrun. Shortly after the first part of the oration, the nguillatufe sacrifices a sheep, and offers a brief prayer to Ngenechen and the generalised ancestors. Parts of the sacrificed animal are burned on the ritual fire. The rising smoke is seen as the morning offering to the ancestral spirits (Foerster 1993: 95). There should be four sessions of sacrifice-dance-prayer on each day of nguillatun, and the ritual should last at least two days. The minimum for achieving a successful ritual is at least two main prayer sessions a day, with one repeating
75 the other. If the ritual is done correctly, the expectation of a good harvest should be met. The community of Andrés Huenupi held its first nguillatun in recent times in 1999. The ritual had not been celebrated for a very long time due to internal power struggles and subsequently a generalised uninterest among community members. During these years Don Artemio and his family had been living in Neuquén in Argentina. On their return to the home community he felt the need to clear up all the misunderstandings and the hostility that had led to the cancellation of the nguillatun.
The petty fights between us Mapuche are destructive in many ways because we are a minority already. We are constantly under attack by the surrounding society and this thing with us arguing among each other make things even more problematic. How are we to get respect from others if we don’t respect ourselves? How are we going to achieve protection from God if we don’t keep our end of the bargain? Because that is exactly what we do when we decide, for one reason or another, to not stage a nguillatun. As I see it, it’s not up to us humans to decide if we celebrate a nguillatun or not. It is so much more than all of us; during a nguillatun we are supposed to come together as Mapuche and we should therefore lay our quarrelling behind.
So, after some intense lobbying from Don Artemio’s side the community agreed to hold a small nguillatun in 1999. It was only held one day as a trial run. As I stated earlier it is customary for a nguillatun to last at least two days for it to be considered successful. My guess is that this trial run could be seen in the same way as Pirrens unorthodox juice libation; it is the thought that counts. I think God did not mind the fact that it was one day short considering that it had been almost twenty years since the last “real” nguillatun. In 2002 it was extended to two days, it was also larger, with the participation of two other communities. When talking about the children’s
76 participation in this nguillatun the following dialogue was carried out between Pirren, the youngest girl, and me:
- Did you take part in the nguillatun? - Of course, I did! - What did you do there? - We did... you know... stuff. Mapuche stuff... that is what we did.
The talk came to a halt as I realised that especially young children equal their parents doing with their own and in this case with the whole ethnic group. Whatever the parents and, subsequently, the child do is explained as “our way”. The feeling is that, “All we do is Mapuche because we are Mapuche”. This is interesting as the child is including itself in the own ethnic group. Their symbolic capital is shared with others who are exactly the same as they act in the same manner. This idea is also reflected in the “spooky bag on the road” incident, I described earlier. In that case the child made a sharp distinction between the own group, which she imagined was under direct attack by the non-Mapuche. In my efforts to examine the girls’ knowledge about the nguillatun I had put aside my own knowledge of the ritual. This was because I did not want to say anything that might explain parts of it that they had not figured out themselves yet. This worked very well until one day when I have to admit I broke my own rule. Pirren and I were in the orchard where we were hanging on to, and violently shaking, the branches of the apple trees so that we could lay our hands on some unripe apples to eat with salt. The conversation had somehow turned, yet again, to the nguillatun celebrated a couple of weeks before my arrival. I asked her about what “Mapuche stuff” she liked best. She thought about it for a while and then said:
77 The horses. I really liked the running of the horses. Round and round they went and the riders yelled and the drums were beating... That was definitely the best part. I’d like to ride like that one day in the nguillatun but the problem is that I don’t know how to ride because I’m afraid of horses or to fall off the horse to be more precise...
When I continued to ask what she thought the riders were doing she looked at me as if I was asking the most stupid question on earth. I decided to rephrase my question and said, “Do you know if the riders and the horses were there for a special reason?” She still looked strangely at me and said, “What reason would that be?” And this is where the anthropology student put her foot in it, “I don’t know... maybe to scare off evil spirits so that they won’t spoil the nguillatun?” As soon as I had said that I remembered my own rule and felt so stupid. But I felt even more stupid when I realised that Pirren was laughing so hard at me that her eyes were filling up with tears. After a while when she had recovered her composure she said, “The horses where there for riding round and that’s it…” Pirrens response illustrates what Schieffelin and Ochs mean when they state that information is processed in a top-down fashion (1986: 3). This is reflected in that children in general become aware of the actions first, while the actions symbolic meaning is revealed to them later on. The first step is to acquire the ability to recognise what social activity is taking place. The second step is to speak and act in ways sensitive to that context. The social event or activity is primarily an information-organising notion. The objects, persons, and verbal and nonverbal behaviour are given meaning later depending on how one defines the activity or event in which they are embedded (ibid.: 3). In Pirrens case, she only saw the riders and the horses as an impressive display within the nguillatun. She will hopefully be taught the meaning of the awun in a later stage, either by direct unrequited tuition or just by her asking about its
78 significance. In any case, I am quite certain that both she and her older sisters are well on their way to becoming fully knowledgeable of the admapu. Mapuche traditional knowledge is still being transmitted to the younger generation, maybe not in the same way as in pre-reservation times as their culture has been forced to make some modifications.
VIII. CHILDREN AND THE LOSS OF CULTURE All societies must deal with the problem of rearing children to become fully human and competent practitioners of their own culture (Lancy 1996: 29). Through the process of socialisation, the children come to internalise the values of the society they have been born into. Culture as information can thus be received, created, stored and transmitted, but it can also be lost. Morton is of the opinion that cultural values can become especially significant symbols of cultural identity and tradition in the context of rapid modernisation and social change (1996: 18). In her study she focuses on the fact that Tongans have become increasingly self-conscious about their cultural identity in recent years. The renewed concern with asserting the strength and importance of Tongan culture has been accompanied and to some extent motivated by growing fears of a weakening or even loss of that culture. Much of this concern is directed at the children, and the socialisation of children has become a critical site for the contestation, construction, and reconstruction of Tongan identity (ibid.: 22). She concludes that the recent emphasis on teaching Tongan language and culture can be seen in part as a response to the widespread concern that younger Tongans are loosing their culture (Morton 1996: 145). The same is expressed by Dentan who claim that the Semai children, the weakest and most timid but also the most vulnerable Semai, have become the
79 focus of protective measures. This is because the transmission of culture to the children is one of the few areas of life over which adults retain control. He states further that raising children is one of the few areas of life in which even the most powerless adults can get the taste of power (Dentan 2001: 115). Both these studies look at how members of minority groups perceive themselves and their culture as under threat by a majority culture. This situation is similar to the Mapuche. When Dentan concludes that, “Most Semai want development, but they say the kind of economic development that is being foisted on them often consists more of expropriation than of modernisation” (2001: 95), he could have been talking about the Mapuche as well. Many of whom I spoke to expressed thoughts that were often centred on the vulnerability of their culture. The girl’s grandmother, for example, often spoke of the past:
When I was a child we used to gather around the fire at dusk. There our parents and grandparents would tell us stories from a glorious past. But as electricity came to our ruka this tradition was lost, nowadays children only watch television. They don’t seem to want to know about our history and our myths. All is just television!
I think the grandmother meant this in a more generalised sense, because it seems to reflect a deeper problem; the feeling that the children are seizing to be ”real” Mapuche altogether. This feeling was shared by many of the older generation who often shook their heads when referring to their grandchildren’s lack of traditional knowledge. The old are, according to Calvo, the only ones who continue to relive their authentic customs. She further states that the youth “have no interest in retaining the legends or maintaining the wisdom of the grandparents” (Calvo 1968: 16). This reflection is further enhanced by her claim that “the Mapuche youth have no desire to inherit the customs of their ancestors” (ibid.: 24). She terms this as “indifference” from the part of the
80 younger generation. My personal feeling is that the children’s knowledge about the admapu, “the right Mapuche way”, is just different but in no way less “real”. To say that the young are indifferent to the Mapuche culture is not just unfair but it also shows a lack of understanding of how the children create their own version of the culture. Because when it comes to moral obligations and the view on important Mapuche characteristics like solidarity and reciprocity, the children clearly demonstrated that they had internalised them. The language issue is more problematic because even though no conscious decision had been made by anyone to stop transmitting the language to their children, some community members, especially the elders, occasionally expressed great annoyance at the fact that the children only speak to them in Spanish. For the older generation the language is, as I mentioned earlier, what makes the Mapuche human and it is therefore closely linked to their ethnic identity. The language socialisation of the children is seen as a way to unite the Mapuche as a group. This is reflected in a statement made by Sierra, “The defence of the language is the central element for the preservation of the identity of the people” (2000: 223). The examples described in the chapter on the importance of Mapudungun show that there is a discrepancy in knowing the language and understanding the language. Clearly the girls and their grandmother have different views of how the language is internalised. The fact that the girls did not speak Mapudungun meant for the grandmother that they did not know the language at all. This seemed a bit of a paradox as she often instructed the girls in Mapudungun and the girls where often able to follow her instructions. This meant, on the other hand, for the girls that they did understand the language and that the grandmother was mistaken in thinking that they did not. When confronted with the idea that knowing a language and understanding a language are two very different things, the girls agreed but did not reflect over the implications it meant in their case. I was told many
81 times especially by Rayen, that the fact that they are Mapuche means that the knowing of the language would come to them “like magic. We know because our parents know. We are meant to know. The day we decide to learn it will be there…” Apart from waiting for the girls themselves to feel the magic and start to learn Mapudungun properly, Don Artemio has other more practical plans to help language socialisation in the community. A project that was developing during my stay was to engage the older members of the community, the lonko, to teach the children Mapudungun at informal meetings at the weekends. This was thought of as a way to familiarise the children with the language and encourage them to learn by telling stories and playing traditional games. The community members see this project just as a beginning as the main issue is the need to implement the teaching of Mapudungun in the local schools. This idea parallels that of Varese that discusses the importance of implementing “an ethnically relevant bilingual and intercultural form of education” (1990: 347). The situation that exists now in Chile is still one of neglect towards the right of the indigenous children to receive bilingual education. Bilingual schooling is not forbidden in any way but it is not promoted either. According to Ennew this may result in that the children often experience a contradiction between the knowledge and values of their homes and the things they are taught at school (2002: 345). This is also reflected on by Barrera, “Education is the heritage for the reproduction and continuity of the knowledge and values of a people. The actual education carried out by the State negates cultural and linguistic variety. It calls for a uniformity that devaluates the being of the Mapuche” (1999: 164f). This may in fact adhere to another statement made by Varese. He claims that the role of formal education is, “to destructure each particular Indian ethnic group by falsifying its history, misinterpreting its culture and invalidating its language as a tool unsuited to modernity and
82 ‘rational’ development” (1990: 349). His article focuses on Mexico but I think that the ideas and arguments in it could be applied to Chile as well, as the Mapuche have seen much of their culture repressed and denied. This view is somewhat shared with Gumucio who states that “the Mapuche have been dispossessed in a cultural sense” (1990: 43). The fact that the Chilean state has not implemented a bilingual education in all Mapuche communities can be seen as a result of that. It can also be seen as a clear example of the lack of recognition of the Chilean society towards the indigenous population. In his article Gumucio suggests that the social and cultural development of the Mapuche must centre on some central questions, one of the points is the acceptance of bilingualism and multiculturalism as important pedagogical principles to be applied in educational programs (1990: 51). This would enable the indigenous knowledge to emerge from its ignored and dismissed status. Ennew also suggests a solution to come to terms with this problem. She argues that the UN “Convention on the Rights of the Child” should not only insist on the right to education. It should go further than that, and demand that provision is made for children to be taught in their own languages and with respect for their own cultures (Ennew 2002: 345). The fact that ethnic minority children are denied bilingual schooling in many parts of the world is particularly damaging to them as language is among other things, an important ethnic boundary. It gives a whole new dimension to ethnicity as it reinforces the ethnic identity. It opens up new images of the culture as well as expanding the room for participation. If the children are not given the opportunity to learn their native language, it puts them in a position where they would eventually loose other important aspects of their culture. Bacigalupo (2001) gives an example of how this can affect children among the Mapuche. In her study of seven machi she came across two cases where the lack of knowledge of Mapudungun was the motive for two young women to abandon their role as machi. This is because the machi
83 that do not speak Mapudungun and/or do not wear the chamal, are highly criticised and mistrusted (2001: 106f). So, even if these young women had been summoned to occupy the role of a machi within their respective communities, their inability to express themselves in Mapudungun had forced them to abandon the path to becoming one. These examples are of course quite extreme but they reflect the point I am trying to make, that the children are in a way robbed of parts of their culture if they do not have the possibility to learn their traditional language. They are excluded from participating in all aspects of their culture. Some children seemed to not even consider themselves as Mapuche even though several signs showed that they are. This paradox was revealed to me in an overcrowded bus between Cunco and Melipeuco. I was sitting on the bus eating grapes while watching the impressive scenery passing by the bus window. Suddenly I overhear a conversation between two teenage boys:
- ...but I am not an “indio”. - I know, but you have a Mapuche surname... right? - Yeah I guess... - Well, you can apply to this scholarship if you are a Mapuche. My grandmother had a Mapuche surname... I am going to use that. I mean, if I can get a scholarship out of it then it is okay! - So, is that all it takes... a Mapuche surname?
This example shows that those who claim that the younger generation is losing the Mapuche culture may have a point. Because it seems that many children or youth, in this case, have not been transmitted important parts of the culture if they are willing to use their ethnic identity only when it is of use to them, like to obtain a scholarship for example. I think that this is just an expression of what happens when their culture is not given recognition by the surrounding majority culture. I mean, if children are not encouraged to feel proud to be Mapuche than who can blame them if they don’t? This issue was also raised
84 by a Chilean woman I came into contact with. She is married to a Mapuche man and lives in the community of Juan Meli in Melipeuco. She told me that she is interested in Mapuche culture mainly because of her sons. She sees it as vital for the sons not to loose the Mapuche culture and stated that she will do what is necessary to achieve that. She goes to all courses available so she can help her husband to pass on the knowledge, “It is an important part of my children’s lives and should therefore not be lost. It is up to us, the parents to not allow it to disappear”. Her sons do not speak Mapudungun, they understand some of it but they do not speak it. She says it might have to do with the discrimination they suffered in school by Chilean teachers. This has made the children “ashamed of their own language”. This resulted in that the oldest one refuses to speak Mapudungun at all but the others have all expressed a desire to learn more. When she thought about this situation she said:
It says more about the teachers than the children really. It is shameful that this still exists, if the children are discriminated because of their origin and language, how can you expect them to want to talk Mapudungun?
I first met this woman at the meeting in Melipeuco I mentioned in chapter six. The opportunity to take part in it, was interesting as it touched upon the theme of this study. The meeting was presented as “a course of further education” and was centred on the Mapuche kimun; the knowing, learning and feeling of the Mapuche worldview. These types of courses are given regularly in the communities in, and around, Melipeuco. Don Artemio sees them as vital as:
People don’t have the knowledge anymore. Like in the nguillatun for example. If you ask them why they perform some of the parts of the ritual they answer that they do what their father or grandfather
85 used to do... but the basic knowledge of why we do certain things are lost. The lonko know... but not the others.
This is why he welcomes these courses because it “never hurts to know more”. At the last community meeting I attended a new project was presented. It goes under the name of GEDES, “Gestión y desarrollo social”, it is carried out by a NGO and was described as “an invitation to dream”. Its aim is to among other things; recover the strength of the Mapuche, detain the migration of the youth, retain the knowledge of the elders, make possible the interaction of young and old, facilitate exchange between different communities, support cultural events, and strengthen the socio-cultural organisation. All this is made with one objective in mind; to reinforce the Mapuche ethnic identity. This process of strengthening Mapuche culture is taking place all over the Araucania, and is described and discussed by several anthropologists. Bacigalupo states that, “Now that the Mapuche cannot fight the invaders like warriors; they combat the effects of the dominant Chilean culture with the reinforcement of their own identity and traditions when facing the foreign” (2001: 82). When referring to this revitalisation process, one of Sierra’s informants says, “We are in a process of affirming our identity as a people. What we have to rescue is a philosophy, not some folklore; a philosophy that is going to be the base for proposing a new type of society. It is about rediscovering values that have been lost” (2000: 61). Another of her informants claims that, “The Mapuche culture is returning. It has not been lost, as some believe” (2000: 132). Perhaps this is the way to approach it, to see the Mapuche culture as awakening from a dormant stage. It will, of course, not be the same as in pre- reservation times because times are different. What is needed, and in many ways already in motion, is the rediscovery and revitalisation of their culture. This process is in large part in the hands of the younger generation, maybe not
86 at present but in the future as they are the ones on whom it falls to reproduce both Mapuche culture and society. For this to turn out successfully I feel that it is important to start examining the children’s situation in their own terms. The tendency to view the younger generation through the eyes of the older is always going to lead to terms like “uninterest” or “indifference”. I do not think that the children are uninterested nor indifferent, many times they verbalise their belonging in the minority culture in indirect ways like for example, when the girls talked about “our mountains”, “the winka”, and “us Mapuche”. They make the vital connection to the Mapu and at the same time they include themselves in the ethnic group by contrasting the own group to those who are outsiders. The traditional knowledge that is passed on is thus internalised by the children in different ways and should be studied instead of just dismissed.
CONCLUSION While anthropologists and some psychologists studied childrearing there was little need to speak or listen to children. It was taken for granted that everyone learns and becomes competent in their respective culture. There was little interest in how this happens and in what that competence is or what the child understands of its cultural world at any given age. As Schwartz so candidly declares, “We have often observed children, but we have usually not taken them seriously as participants who possess an emerging competence as constituent members of a culture” (1981: 10). Research on children’s thinking have mainly been concentrated on their ability of solve mathematical or logical problems. There is relatively little on their image of social reality which is built up from their experience and observations of their surrounding environment (Shields and Duveen 1986: 174). It is on this latter issue that anthropology can make a contribution,
87 because when it comes to gaining knowledge about children and their conditions, an anthropological perspective is especially important because child life is shaped quite differently around the world, like the view of what a child is and how they are integrated in social life. Despite this there are similarities that can not be ignored, like for example the fact that most people see children as a separate category, irrespective of what is included in that category (Norman 1996: 227). The “ethnography of childhood” is crucial in gaining a fuller understanding of the mechanisms by which cultures and societies are actually reproduced as ideological and moral systems. The documentation of variation in socialisation practices in different cultures may be of value in several ways. Ziegler is of the opinion that the study of intercultural variation in socialisation practices lets us see our own practices in a broader human perspective (1982: 117). He emphasises the fact that one advantage of studying intercultural variation is that it permits us to test, on a world-wide scale, some of the possible causes and consequences of socialisation practices (ibid.: 120). I agree with Jahoda and Lewis, when they state that we need to advance our understanding of the manner in which children come to adopt the prevailing social categories, values and norms in the context of their widening social relationships (1986: 29), because at present we know surprisingly little of the cultural competence of children as constituent participants in culture. Schwartz makes the same point when he declares that, “the ethnography of childhood remains a genuine frontier” (1981: 16). Twenty years have gone by since Schwartz made that statement, but the situation is more or less the same; there are still very few accounts of childhood and child development that satisfy the anthropological canons of ethnographic fullness and fidelity. It is of great importance to ground the study of children in the local ethnographic context with as full an account as
88 possible of indigenous psychological assumptions, general values and cosmological beliefs. Benthall is more optimistic when he claims that there are enough studies of children by anthropologists to form a tradition. He is of the opinion that there is evidence of theoretical innovation. As an example of this he mentions the refusal to see children as empty buckets filling up with culture and of responsiveness to questions of children’s welfare and rights. He is adamant in declaring that anthropology adds a cross-cultural perspective to an ongoing debate as the possibility of access to the perspectives of the children themselves (not only those of their parents or carers), gives the anthropologist’s practice of participant observation an advantage. He concludes that, “cross-cultural child-focused research has within it the potential to reorient anthropology itself “ (Benthall 1992: 1). From being near- invisible in the mainstream anthropological literature, or at least “seen but not heard”, children may now be recognised as a source for demonstrating one of anthropology’s great strengths – its refusal to be silent about those things that people cannot speak about (Benthall 1992: 25). It seems possible that, within a decade or so, many anthropologists will find it analytically valuable to give attention to distinctions between childhood and adulthood in particular social contexts (ibid.: 23). The level of the individual’s experiences of tradition and the ways in which tradition is constructed through socialisation has been the main focus of this study. This is because I feel that it is important to make studies that emphasise the relationships between and among cultural identity, notions of personhood, and the experiencing Self. This thesis argues that the conceptions the Mapuche have about language, children, the Self and their interpretation of their socio-cultural world are central to understanding why the Mapudungun is slowly disappearing. But at the same time it should not, in the case that is presented
89 here, be assumed that the traditional language is in a death process. At the contrary, I feel that measures are taken to amend this. It is my view that anthropology should make an effort to gain deeper knowledge about, and emphasise the relationships between and among cultural identity, notions of personhood, and the experiencing Self. And what better way to do it, than by studying children?
90 GLOSSARY Ad – “the face of things”, customs and traditions Admapu – traditional law Awun – encirclement of ceremonial field by riders on horses Chamal – traditional black dress worn by women Chiñurra – a Chilean woman, a Mrs. (from the Spanish “señora”) Coyaya – ant Epu mari epu – twenty two (literally two ten two) Filkun – snake Kalku – sorcerer/witch Kimun – Mapuche knowledge Kofke – bread Kultrun – ritual drum Lonko – moral and religious leader (literally head) Machi – shaman skilled in herbal medicine Mai – yes Mapuche – people of the earth (mapu =earth, land, territory / che = people) Mapudungun – talk of the earth, matter of the land Ngenechen – impersonal force, often referred to as “Supreme Being” or “Creator” Nguillatufe – ritual priest in charge of the nguillatun (often a lonko) Nguillatun – communal agricultural fertility ritual Palin – land hockey game Peuma – dream Pichi – small, little Pifülka – flute Purun – ritual communal dance Rewe – altar Ruka – traditional house Trapial – lion Trewa – dog Trutruka – long trumpet Wekufe – the forces of evil Winka – those who are not Mapuche
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